by Warren Adler
“Same,” the eggplant said.
“You can go home now.” The eggplant had edged over to her.
“I thought . . .”
“I know what you thought,” he interrupted. His nicotine breath washed over her. “The other is a goddamned open case.”
“At least the heat will be off of us,” she said. It was an effort to be ingratiating. She detested the reflex.
“Me,” he retorted, patting his chest. “Off me.”
Teddy had been watching them from a bench in the far corner of the room. Autopsies always made him queasy.
“I hope that guy’s right. I was praying for anything but a forty-four.” His eyes were sunk in deep dark circles. He reminded her of Bruce, confronting his own abyss. His weakness irritated her and she turned back to Dr. Benton. He untied the back strings of his apron, then lit a cigarette, pinching it between thumb and forefinger.
She hung back until the other men had finished their inquiries and left the room. The corpse lay on the metal table, covered with a rubber pad. For some reason, Benson struck her as being more thoughtful than fatigued. A nest of wrinkles etched his brow.
“What is it?” she asked softly. He did not reply at once, and glanced around the room, as if to assure himself that they were alone.
“The two shots,” he whispered. There was a touch of the bureaucrat about him. His reports were always concise and accurate, never speculative, and he rarely volunteered extraneous theories to his superiors. Because she admired him, she liked to think this reticence was wisdom but she knew better. He was a brilliant man but no hero.
“Why would a murderer fire a second bullet at close range in the man’s belly, after blowing apart his heart?”
“You know that?”
“Know?” He looked at her. “Suspect. It is different. It’s something one doesn’t put in a report. Not precise enough.”
“Maybe he didn’t know about anatomy.”
“But why actually lower the gun? The belly shot wasn’t the fatal one in the first place. Why not just shoot the bullets into the chest and head, the places of sure death?”
“Accident,” she countered. “Or he simply couldn’t stop himself. Who knows what was in the man’s mind?” A killer’s logic, she had learned, never traveled in a straight line.
“A terrorist would be thinking only of elimination. Why waste a shot? He was already at close range.”
“Just because the eggplant . . .” She corrected herself, not wanting to draw him into her private war. “. . . Captain Greene said it was. Doesn’t mean it’s so.” Out of respect for his caution she did not elaborate.
“And if a terrorist was looking for an insurance shot, why move the barrel out of range of the vital organ?” He was repeating himself as if to emphasize the point.
“Are you on this case?” he asked suddenly, his cool eyes alert and cautious.
“I was looking for some connection between this and Damato.”
He thought a moment and nodded.
“A public building. A single killer . . .” she began, trailing off as the list of similarities spent themselves. “Intuition . . .” She hated the term.
“Subconscious thinking,” he corrected.
“Maybe I have something to prove,” she confessed, lowering her voice as if to further reassure him that this was a purely private consultation.
“Dangerous,” he sighed, understanding instantly. “It sometimes interferes with one’s strategy for survival.”
“You think maybe they’ll think I’m an uppity honky broad?”
“They think that anyhow,” he smiled. “The power structure doesn’t like anyone to stand up in the rowboat.” He sighed. “Aside from medicine, this is my particular expertise.” His concentration drifted. “It was my wife’s fatal flaw. That kind of courage can kill.”
“So far I’ve been a good little girl.” She paused, rethinking. “That’s bullshit. They think I’m a bumbling bitch. Since that gallery case I’m getting the treatment. You haven’t helped. I could have left this room like them. Without doubts.”
“So it’s a form of vengeance,” he said, his smile fading. “Maybe you shouldn’t take my speculations so seriously.”
She felt on the verge of indignation. It was narrow, small-minded. Clouding one’s objectivity sapped one’s strength. She went over it in her mind, then concluded that he was partially right.
“Maybe.”
“I’m not against it,” he said. “But if you’re not subtle about it, it can backfire, go against your self-interest.” He waited for her reaction. For him, talking in riddles apparently offered a kind of cerebral pleasure. She nodded her understanding. Beneath the facade of amiability were the scarred remains of thwarted ambition. Reaching out, she squeezed his upper arm. It was a distinctly manly gesture.
“I’ll be careful,” she said.
He removed his bloodstained apron, like the proprietor of a butcher shop closing for the day.
“If I find a connection in my mind, I’ll let you know,” he said, putting on his jacket. “But I’d be willing to wager that this killing was not political.”
“I won’t take the bet,” she said. There was not a single hard clue to support her own instinct.
The killing of Jorge Perfidio was the banner headline in the Post. To his credit, the eggplant had maintained a low profile. But to her horror, as she read the news account, she discovered the chief had stuck his nose into the limelight.
“D.C. Police Chief Roy Howard told reporters that he had called in the FBI, Interpol, the Argentine security agency and other government agencies to investigate the killing. ‘We cannot have this in our town,’ he said. ‘We must all join forces to stem the import of foreign terrorism. If this continues, we will have to develop a capability to combat the menace. This will take some recognition on the part of the Congress, fundwise.’ “
There was no reference in the story to the previous killing. It was as though it had been deliberately excised as irrelevant. Not only had the chief taken the heat off the department, he had begun to lobby for more funds.
By evening the story had built. The President held a special press conference to decry terrorism. The Argentines had also gotten into the act. The ambassador was shown before a bank of microphones after carrying a protest message to the Secretary of State. Three days later the story was still simmering.
“Everybody into the sludge,” Bruce said, openly envious as he slouched on her sofa, drink in hand. “I need something like that to boost my campaign.”
He had come back from New York, discouraged and edgy. Taking the day off, she had devoted the time to preparing a nice dinner for him to chase his blues. He ate little, preferring instead to sip Scotch. To take his mind off his own troubles, she had told him the details of the case, expressing her intuitive doubts.
“They could be wrong,” Fiona said. It seemed to spark his interest.
“That doesn’t matter. It’s the exposure. It’s the style, not the substance. Besides, the conclusion is safe. A little killing has just slopped over from Argentina. So what else is new?” His perception came from light miles away and she could tell that his reactions related only to his campaign. Discouragement had also deepened his cynicism. Getting up from the table, he sprawled on the couch. She sat down beside him and gently nudged his head into her lap, massaging his temples.
“It’s getting worse, Fi,” he said grimly. “I can’t seem to rally the troops. My opponent, the spic bastard, calls me irrelevant and there’s an undercurrent of Jew stuff just surfacing. The district’s changing so fast I just can’t relate to it.”
“Everything’s changing,” she said.
“What the hell is your frame of reference?” he said with sudden anger, pushing her away. She did not respond, hoping it would pass.
“If only she wasn’t a woman,” he said after a pause, his anger vented. “I don’t know how to handle it.” He let her hands soothe him again. “I just don’t know how to
handle women.”
“Maybe we should come with an instruction kit?”
“No maybes.”
“You expect every woman to be like your mommy.”
“Now there’s insight. You bet your ass. I fear now for all those little boys approaching puberty.”
“They’ll be tougher. The next generation will know how to handle us girls.”
“They won’t handle nothing. They’ll all be castrated.”
“Now that would be a pity.” She reached for him there as if to reassure him. In the soft light his eyes glistened moistly.
“I need you, Fi,” he whispered. “With me. Always.”
“Are you sure it’s not just generic? Man needing woman?”
“That, too.”
“The vectors have to intersect,” she said stupidly. They rarely do, she thought. To him her career was an annoyance, to be disposed of sometime in the future. Was being needed by him enough for her? The question was at the core of her uncertainty. It was incredible how little they understood about each other.
“Do you love me?” he asked gently, disengaging. For the first time in her life she felt the danger of surrender. She wanted to say: Define that, as if she were sweating a witness. Actually, she had resisted the definition ever since she had met him. If it had to do with longing, she did have her moments. And when he was near her, like now, she felt the full power of her sexuality. Could it be sustained for a lifetime? Or was she asking too much of life? She responded by kissing him deeply on the lips.
“I hope you love me, Fi,” he said. “Because that’s what I need most of all.” She felt him pressing her, selling, persuading.
“Take me in,” he whispered. “And never let me out. Let’s marry.”
A part of her was ready for surrender. Its implications frightened her. He was thinking primarily of his own immediate needs and aspirations.
“We’ll see,” she whispered, unsure of what it meant. “After the campaign.”
“Yeah,” he drawled. “Maybe then.”
12
REMINGTON smeared grease on his burned hand, carefully applied gauze, then wrapped it with surgical tape. The bandage inhibited the mobility of his fingers and he had to utilize one of those clip-on black ties that he detested.
He was showered, shaved, bandaged and ready at the moment the door chimes echoed through the house and his first guests arrived. He had deliberately set the party for that date and time. The guest of honor was the Secretary-General of the OAS, Manuel Ricardo. The cosmic judge would surely enjoy the irony.
A tall man in impeccable tails, the regular butler at his sit-down dinners, opened the door and pointed to Remington, who stood at his regular receiving place in the foyer. The first guests were Senator and Mrs. Harrison from Montana.
“What the hell happened to your hand, Tad?” Harrison asked, after Remington had implanted the obligatory two-cheeker on Mrs. Harrison’s heavily rouged cheeks.
“The hammer missed,” he said with a grin.
Other guests began to arrive—the Swiss and German ambassadors, the assistant secretary of the Treasury, a titled European and his wife. Remington’s small dinner parties were known for their “A” mix, three or four top diplomats, a senator or two, sometimes a member of the Cabinet, a titled couple and, if possible, a cultural figure or someone from the world of high finance, a highly decorated general.
Servants passed drinks and hors d’oeuvres in the big room, dominated by his heroic portrait. In the dining room, hidden by a brocaded screen, white-gloved waiters put the final touches on three tables for eight. Passing from guest to guest, he joked about his bandaged hand.
“You look marvelous,” one of the women whispered, the wife of the German ambassador, a Nordic beauty with huge breasts, suitably displayed. She had coquettishly assaulted him on earlier occasions.
“An appellation that doesn’t begin to describe you,” he said with a wink. “Someday I intend to emulate Hannibal,” he added, watching a blush begin below her neck and move downward. He knew she loved the suggestive banter.
“I hope you have a herd of strong elephants.”
“I can vouch for their trunks,” he whispered in her ear. She giggled with pleasure.
He felt buoyant. High. Deliciously stimulated. His mind seemed fresher, his voice deeper. He had never felt more articulate, more witty and charming.
“Do you expect a plum if the Republicans win, Tad?” General MacIntosh asked. He was a squat yet imposing man, a three-star general.
“I’m keeping a low profile.”
“But if something big was offered?” the general persisted.
“That would depend.” It was the perfect note, knowing yet noncommittal. “They have to win first.”
He moved away, checking his watch. Dinner would begin precisely at nine. The guests of honor, Manuel Ricardo and his wife, had not arrived. It was all part of the preordained plan, the perfect irony. The Pan American Union Building was the showcase of the OAS. His guest list made no allowances for a no-show. Ricardo’s presence would be still another validation to be added to the others.
“It was an absolutely ghastly act,” someone said, the remark casually flung across the room. He turned to find the knobby face of Countess Faille, looking agitated and already slightly tipsy. “I heard it on the radio as we were coming here.”
“What?” someone inquired.
“The shooting.” The buzz of conversation lost its momentary rhythm.
“Someone in the Pan American Union,” the countess exclaimed, taking another drink from a silver tray.
“It better not come to this country,” General MacIntosh asserted.
“What?” Remington asked.
“Terrorists,” the general muttered.
“You think that . . .” Remington checked himself and turned away to hide his surprise. Terrorists?
Excusing himself, he stepped behind the screen. The waiters nodded, alert and ready. His experienced eye surveyed each table setting, the flower arrangements, the Waterford crystal, the rare plate, the polished silver. The plate, his mother’s pride, had once belonged to Czar Nicholas. Somehow she had managed to get her hands on it before Marjorie Merriwether Post could get to it. The memory was reassuring.
“You’d be proud of me, my darling,” he told himself, certain of his mother’s presence nearby. “We shall have an exquisite celebration.”
At that moment he heard the chimes and rushed to the hall to greet the guests of honor.
The Secretary-General and his wife looked pale and shaken.
“You cannot imagine,” Mrs. Ricardo said breathlessly.
“Cold-blooded bastards. They attacked the poor man inside the building.”
They, he thought, enjoying their reaction.
“It’s frightening. They’ll stop at nothing,” Mrs. Ricardo said, taking a Scotch from a tray. “I really need this.” She took a deep swallow.
“America is no longer safe,” the Secretary-General sputtered. “We are no longer immune here.”
“Who do you suppose it was?” Remington was all innocence.
“Crazies,” Ricardo said, with Latin emotion. “They have no ideology. Destroy for the sake of destruction. The world is going mad.”
“We’ll have to put a stop to it,” General MacIntosh said, as the other guests crowded around the Secretary-General and his wife, eager for details.
The conversation of his guests drifted in and out of his consciousness. Remington listened vaguely, his mind transcending the sense of time and place as he recalled the act, the firing of the pistol, the startled look on the man’s face, the surge of ecstasy. He was translating history, illustrating power, recycling his mother’s compelling desires. Are you proud of me, mother? he cried within himself. He was certain that she could hear him as he withdrew again into the tunnel of his memoy.
A fall rain had deepened the green of the back lawn of the great house. Puffs of clouds passed over an incredibly blue sky and San Francisco
Bay in the distance merged the colors into aqua dotted with foaming whitecaps.
Until then, at the height of his Senate campaign, he had been brave, with an inner invincibility, like hers, that could not be broached. Now the polls showed him losing. He was getting a bad press and words like elitism and dilettante were being used as cruel and deliberate barbs. The prospect of loss came crashing in on him, squeezing out his courage.
“They don’t understand,” his mother said. “They are fools.”
“Whatever they are doesn’t matter. I’m losing.”
“You will not lose. You’ll see.”
“Maybe I can’t hack it, mother. Maybe I can’t realize your expectations?”
“That is unworthy of us, Tad,” she said with lofty scorn. “We don’t give up.”
“I am just facing reality.”
“Whose?” she snapped, her blue eyes widening. “They are not going to beat us. Never. And you, my dear, are heading for the White House. It is as simple as that.”
“Nothing is as simple as that,” he had protested.
“Now, now,” she said, smoothing his hair again, forcing him closer, enfolding him in her warmest embrace. She had made a refuge for him out of herself.
The memory was as real as his skin and he felt the familiar tug of pleasure at the center of himself.
The details of the dinner had been impeccably planned. Deliberately, he had not shared the honors with a surrogate hostess. Because it was his mother’s celebration as well, he dared not profane it. One of the tables, subtly larger than the others, had been set for nine, and he had inserted himself between the wife of the Secretary-General and the wife of the German ambassador.
“None of us are safe any more,” Mrs. Ricardo said.
He wished she would stop harping on that. She drank glass after glass of white wine, ignoring the vichyssoise. Her deep-set brown eyes flitted about, agitated, like those of a trapped bird. He felt mischievous.
“Who was the victim?” he asked, taking the hand of the wife of the German ambassador under the table, as if drawing her into his private conspiracy. The returned pressure on his fingers assured her complicity.