Stalking Horse (The Lt. Hastings Mysteries)

by Collin Wilcox

  “I—I don’t understand,” Friedman said. But, even as he said it, he looked quickly at me before his eyes darted toward the bedroom. Watching him, she nodded. “You see, you’re surprised. You didn’t know.”

  Involuntarily, both Friedman and I rose to our feet as she said, “It was all for nothing.” Her eyes lost focus as she looked gently toward the bedroom. Once more she’d retreated from reality, deep in delayed shock. “All for nothing,” she repeated. “All that killing, for nothing. Because he’s dead, you see. He died at eleven-eighteen, after I told him about Lloyd. I remembered the time, you see. Because it’ll be important. For history.”

  Thirty-three

  THREE HOURS LATER, AT three-thirty Wednesday morning, I was sitting alone in Ann’s kitchen drinking a glass of milk and, considering whether or not to eat the generous slice of cherry pie she’d left for me. Earlier, about four o’clock Tuesday afternoon, I’d called her to say that I couldn’t make it home for dinner. I’d promised to be home by midnight, though—if possible. When I’d said “if possible,” I’d heard her sigh. She knew what that phrase meant. And so did I.

  Four o’clock Tuesday …

  The whole world, it seemed, had tipped on its axis since four o’clock. By pure chance, I’d found Frederick Tharp—and lost him. By nightfall Tharp was dead, doubtless killed by a bullet from Eason’s gun. Carrying a bullet in his shoulder, Eason had called Katherine Bayliss for help. She’d met him at the Embarcadero and killed him with his own gun. Carrying the suitcase filled with money, she’d left the loading shed and walked along the dark, deserted Embarcadero until she got to Market Street. She’d hailed a cab and returned to the Fairmont. She’d told Ryan that their son was dead—and Eason, too. Then she’d watched Ryan die.

  She hadn’t admitted to Friedman and me that she’d killed Eason, but she hadn’t denied it, either. By tomorrow—Thursday—we would have the evidence complete: the fingerprints, the dust and soil samples, the ballistics tests, the paraffin tests on Eason and Katherine Bayliss. We would have the tests of Eason’s clothes and his car, looking for traces of manure. We’d have the certified Yellow Cab records and the Fairmont’s phone records. When we forwarded the evidence to the D.A., our job would be finished. If he asked for an indictment and Katherine Bayliss was still in San Francisco, we would arrest her. If she was in Washington, we would begin extradition proceedings.

  If.

  If she incriminated herself. If she admitted the murder, she would be indicted.

  But by now she had a team of the best lawyers money could buy. They would advise her to simply keep quiet while they worked out a convincing scenario. Following the cardinal rule, they would use the truth whenever possible, improvising only when absolutely essential. In the shootout with Tharp, the lawyers would contend, Eason had been wounded. He’d called Bayliss for help. But when she arrived at the loading shed, she’d found Eason dead. An unnamed third party—the dead Tharp’s accomplice, possibly—had followed Eason and killed him with his own gun. Unfortunately Katherine had handled the gun, accounting for her fingerprints on the gun and the burnt powder on her hands.

  But why, the D.A. might ask, would the mysterious accomplice kill Eason and then leave the money behind for Katherine to find? Obviously, the lawyers would reply, Katherine had scared the murderer off.

  All she had to do was remain quiet, as she’d done tonight. The lawyers and the politicians would do the rest. Already Friedman and I had been ordered to keep our suspicions strictly to ourselves. The D.A., too, was keeping his suspicions secret. In the hush surrounding the death of Donald Ryan, suspicions of murder seemed obscene.

  When we’d learned that Donald Ryan was dead, Friedman and I had turned to the bedroom to see the body for ourselves and to secure the suitcase full of money. Then, out of long habit, I’d put in a call to the coroner. It had been our first mistake. We should have called in additional witnesses, protecting ourselves against charges of publicity-seeking—and worse. Yet instinctively we’d wanted to get the death of Donald Ryan on the public record. We didn’t want the responsibility of keeping the news a secret even for a minute. Without admitting it to each other, Friedman and I had been awed to think that chance had put us in the path of history.

  With Katherine, we’d returned to the suite’s living room. It was then that we made our second mistake. Instead of continuing to question Katherine while we waited for the coroner, trying to force a confession from her, we’d called Dwyer, in Ferguson’s suite. The result had been a madhouse, with Dwyer and Richter working at cross-purposes, giving contradictory orders. Instantly, it seemed, reporters materialized, snapping at our heels. Whatever chance we had of getting a confession had been squandered.

  Finally drawing him aside, Friedman and I told Dwyer that Frederick Tharp was Donald Ryan’s illegitimate son by Katherine Bayliss and that Katherine Bayliss had probably killed Eason, avenging her son’s death. Dwyer had literally paled at the news. When we told him that in her own room Katherine Bayliss was being given a paraffin test, he’d had to sit down. For Friedman it had been the only redeeming moment of a long, hard day.

  Jack Ferguson had been the first civilian to enter Ryan’s suite. He’d looked once at Ryan’s body, then returned to the living room where he’d begun making phone calls. Neither his voice nor his manner gave any clue to his feelings. But when Ferguson learned that a detective had escorted Katherine to her room and that she might be arrested, he turned on me in a cold fury, demanding an explanation. I could only tell him that he would have to talk to Dwyer and Richter, or the D.A. For an instant I thought Ferguson would hit me. But in the next instant he’d regained his self-control, turning again to the phone, his most potent weapon. A lawyer was called and told to stay with Katherine. Then a publicist was summoned and instructed to put out the news of Ryan’s death. Listening to Ferguson, I realized that a publicity release had already been prepared and needed only an update. James Ryan was summoned and instructed to call his mother and sister. Then he’d been told to hold himself in readiness for further orders.

  To keep the chain of evidence intact and to see that the body remained undisturbed until the coroner took over, I stayed in the suite, sitting on the velvet sofa. Across the room, Ferguson was still making one staccato phone call after another, many of them to Washington—and one to the White House. As he talked, I could hear excitement building in his voice as he began to formulate a plan. Instead of a tribute to Donald Ryan, he began to tell the people he called, tomorrow’s dedication ceremony would become a eulogy, a living memorial. Of course, the President would want to come, along with the Vice-President. It would be a built-in opportunity for high-level drama and world-wide publicity, Ferguson suggested, all in good taste. And, naturally, the media would cooperate. Already, the plans were developing nicely. Yes, the family would rally around, thoroughbreds all, even in their sorrow. (And, yes, Belle could be “managed.”)

  Slowly, the suite began to fill with people. The coroner and Ryan’s two doctors took over the bedroom, along with the lab crew. In the living room, Richter and Dwyer still bickered viciously over their jurisdictions and their prerogatives. In the hallway, talking to the reporters, the two men jockeyed for the best camera angles. Friedman suggested strongly that Dwyer and Richter move their “command post” to the FBI room down the hall. Then we told Ferguson that Ryan’s suite must be cleared in preparation for the removal of the body. Grudgingly, Ferguson helped us clear the suite. When last seen, Ferguson was walking down the corridor talking simultaneously with three men. Two of the men, I later discovered, were Ryan’s lawyers, acting for Katherine Bayliss. With Dwyer’s permission, the lawyers had already talked to Bayliss, a clear breach of established procedure since she hadn’t yet been booked. Dwyer, it seemed, would do anything to keep Katherine out of jail. I wondered whether the D.A. would take the same view.

  Friedman and I were the last to leave the suite, following Ryan’s body on its gurney to the freight elevator. We sealed the door
to Ryan’s suite and ordered a guard posted. We verified that Bayliss’s room would be secured, along with Eason’s. Dwyer had just finished talking to the small group of network newsmen, eagerly answering questions and posing for the cameras. Friedman and I drew Dwyer aside and asked him whether we should take Katherine Bayliss into custody. No, he answered, he’d handle it. Friedman and I were relieved of further duties.

  So, exhausted, we’d gone downstairs and said goodnight in front of the Fairmont. Without saying it in so many words, we’d agreed that we’d go along with Dwyer, whatever he decided to do about Katherine. We wouldn’t talk to the media. Breaking our promise, we wouldn’t even talk to Dan Kanter. We’d let Dwyer do what he wanted, without comment—or help. We would cover our asses.

  As I finished the milk, I heard a key turn in the front door. The time was almost four A.M. Dan had been out on the town.

  “Hi, Frank. Still up, eh?” With a loud sigh, he sat across the table. “Working?”

  “I’m afraid so. What about you? Playing?”

  Ruefully, he grinned. “Playing—yeah. I guess you might call it playing. Nancy and me, we went to a movie.”

  “A late movie.”

  “Yeah, well, you know. We listened to some music afterwards. And then we, ah, talked.”

  “Talked, eh?” Having decided against the cherry pie, I poured myself a second glass of milk.

  He grinned again, then shook his head, sighing heavily. “I guess I’ll never be able to figure women out, you know? Honest to God, it’s—” Once more, he shook his head. “It’s impossible to figure them out. Completely.”

  “You’re not the first man to have said that,” I answered. “And I’m sure you won’t be the last.”

  “I guess it was the same when you were young, eh?”

  “Dan, it never changes. It’s always the same. In fact, in some ways, it can get worse, the older you get.”

  I saw his glance sharpen speculatively, then saw his eyes slide subtly away as both of us realized that I could be talking about his mother. What was he thinking as he looked at me across the breakfast table? Was he imagining Ann and me in bed, making love?

  For a moment we sat silently, looking in different directions. Then I heard him clear his throat.

  “I—ah—guess my father, he’s making things pretty tough for you and my mom.” He was frowning down at the table as he said it, concentrating on an invisible design he was tracing with his forefinger.

  “Yes,” I answered, “I guess you’re right.”

  “Yeah. Well—” He retraced the design. “Well, Dad can be pretty—you know—rigid, sometimes. He doesn’t think so, but he is.”

  I decided not to reply. I simply sat sipping the milk—and hoping.

  “What I’m saying,” he said, “is that I think it’s—you know—it’s kind of neat, that you and Mom—you know—get along, and everything. I think it’s really okay. And so does Billy. He’s even got a scrapbook about you, and everything.”

  “He—” I blinked. “He does?”

  “Yeah. Really.”

  Suddenly I realized that I couldn’t think of anything to say. Across the table, I heard Dan clear his throat. “I guess that if you and Mom, if you ever got married, then that would—” Once more, he cleared his throat. “I guess that’d solve a lot of problems.”

  “Yes,” I answered slowly. “Yes, I guess it would.” Now I was tracing my own design on the table. We sat through a long, taut silence, both of us aware that something more must be said.

  “You want some milk?” I asked finally, pushing the carton across the table.

  “No. We had pizza, Nancy and me.” As he said it, he ventured a direct look at me.

  “Oh. Well, in that case—” I pushed my chair back. “In that case, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go down the hall, and wake up your mother and tell her about this little talk we’ve been having.”

  We grinned at each other, and shook hands across the table.

  Turn the page to continue reading from the Lt. Hastings Mysteries

  One

  FROM THE KITCHEN I heard the sound of the refrigerator door closing, followed a few moments later by the sound of water running. Ann had drunk her half glass of nonfat milk and rinsed out the glass, a nightly ritual. The click of the light switch in the kitchen came next, followed by the rhythmical shuffling of her slippers on the hallway carpet. I opened my eyes as she came into the bedroom. She slipped out of her robe and draped it over the foot of the bed, then stood motionless in the darkness, silhouetted against the pale oblong of the room’s large single window. Her nightgown was sheer: soft, transparent gauze tracing the swell of her breasts, the curve of her stomach and thigh. Her hair was loose around her shoulders. She was standing with her chin lifted, back arched, as if she were trying to identify some distant sound in the night.

  Did she know how erotic her body was, outlined against the pale window light? Had I ever told her that she excited me more when she wore her nightgown than when she was naked?

  Did she know that, yes, I could feel myself tightening, sexually quickening?

  “You have a chronic case of the weekend hots,” she’d once said, mischievously teasing me after we’d made love. And, yes, she was right. For as long as I could remember, Friday and Saturday nights were those special times for love.

  But it was no longer Friday night. It was 2:15 A.M. Saturday morning. Beneath a blanket of fog blowing in from the ocean, San Francisco was finally falling silent. The theaters were dark, and the bars had just closed. Only the hookers and the bathhouses and the after-hours clubs were still doing business.

  We’d gone to a small French restaurant in the neighborhood for dinner, then gone to a movie—a double feature. Driving home, yawning and laughing about it, we’d ruefully agreed that Friday night double features were for teenagers.

  Now she was turning to sit on her side of the bed while she took off her slippers, bending down to align them perpendicularly to the bed. Ann is a precise person, a methodical person, a person who depends on order in her life. She teaches fourth grade at the City School for Boys, one of San Francisco’s few private schools. Once, visiting her in her classroom after school, I’d chided her about her pens and pencils, each one aligned so precisely in her center desk drawer.

  I’d drawn back the blanket for her, as I always did. She slid beneath the covers, sighed once, deeply, then turned toward me—as I turned toward her. I slid my left hand between the pillow and her neck. I felt her body responding, moving closer to mine.

  But it was a tentative response, gently temporizing. She kissed me: a light, noncommittal kiss. The message was clear. Tonight—this particular Friday night—she was too tired. She hoped—believed—that I would understand.

  Confirming it, she buried her face in the hollow of my shoulder, whispering: “I’m pooped. Aren’t you?” As she spoke, I felt her body come tentatively closer. But, like the kiss, it was a confirmation of affection, not an invitation to make love.

  “Well—” I moved my right hand, lightly caressing the small of her back, exploring that particular mystery of flesh between the cleft of her buttocks and the base of her spine. My message, I knew, was equally clear: Yes, I understood that she was tired. But, no, I couldn’t quite forget that it was, after all, Friday night.

  “How about tomorrow night?” she whispered, still with her head tucked into the hollow of my shoulder.

  “Promise?”

  “Promise.”

  “We’ve got a deal.” I tilted her head and kissed her. She kissed me in return, patted me companionably on the rump, sighed, then turned away from me to lie on her back, settling herself with small, sinuous shiftings of body and limbs.

  “Good night.” I turned on my side, yawning as I let my eyes close.

  The weekend hots …

  To myself, I smiled. I’d first met Ann in the line of duty, standing on her porch in the dead of night with my shield in my hand. My first impression of her had been acc
urate. “Quiet.” “Reserved.” “Sometimes shy.” Those were the adjectives that described Ann. Plus the old-fashioned adjective “ladylike.”

  Her older son Dan, a teenager, had been a witness to murder, and briefly a suspect. My second interrogation had confirmed that Dan had no guilty knowledge. But, as long as the investigation continued, I found excuses to call at Ann’s large, tastefully furnished Victorian flat on Green Street—the flat we now shared, together with her two sons. When the investigation terminated, I knocked on her door again, to tell her about it. Then, with great effort, I asked her to dinner. She’d accepted with a smile that made me feel like a euphoric, erotic teenager. During that first dinner, we exchanged our life stories. She’d been born in Cleveland, where her father practiced high-stakes law and her mother raised prize-winning roses. But the father was a compulsive philanderer, and her mother began secretly drinking, to forget. College had been Ann’s first chance to escape from an unhappy home, and she chose the University of California at Berkeley because it was farther from Cleveland than the eastern colleges. In her junior year she met Victor Haywood, a sophomore medical student. They were married at the end of Ann’s junior year, when Ann was two months’ pregnant. She dropped out of school, raising her child and working part time while Victor took a residency in psychiatry. As the years passed, she had another son, went back to college, graduated, and got a teaching certificate—while her husband bought Porsches and collected pre-Columbian art. Most of Victor’s patients were neurotic society matrons, many of whom he slept with. When their younger son, Billy, was ten years old, Ann decided to. …

  On the nightstand, the telephone rang. Muttering a muffled obscenity, I picked it up on the first ring. Beside me, Ann’s body jerked convulsively; she’d been asleep.

  “Yes?” I spoke softly, at the same time swinging my legs over the side of the bed to sit with my back turned to Ann.