Hobbs sat up straight in his chair. “Let’s stay with Grace for now. When I talked to Budd Rosselli, he still thought she was involved in her husband’s murder, although it’s clear she wasn’t the shooter. All he has is a maybe motive. But now the motive seems a bit more than just maybe. Let’s assume there were eight or ten million in diamonds. So she steals them and she gets someone to kill Lichtman. But who?”
For the past few days my conscious and unconscious had been busy sorting out information and turning it into theory. I spoke it out loud for the first time.
“Polozola was a female impersonator,” I started. “I showed Grace’s photo to someone who knew Polozola back in his transvestite days; guy said he bore a striking resemblance to Grace. She lied to me about where she met him. She said at some function in Portland, but she met him at a car dealership in El Cajon, Southern California. From what I turned up, it was as if she had recruited him.”
Hobbs pulled out his flask. He stared at it for a beat before he took a long swig. He walked to my office door, turned around and then walked back and stood in front of my desk. For the first time I noticed a paperback book in his right suit pocket. I couldn’t make out anything but Forensics on the cover. “Okay,” he said finally, “so she steals million in diamonds. Recruits Polozola to kill her husband; he goes in drag looking just like her while she has the perfect alibi. What did Rosselli call it? A dream team alibi. But how does she know about a transvestite who looks just like her? How does she know who to recruit and where to find him?”
I sipped some more coffee, it now having gone from lukewarm to cold. “Hear me out on this, Hobbs: the principal of this scam, the strawman, is a crazy old bastard named John Smith. Smith was recruited by Polozola. Out of the blue. Recruited to turn Smith’s crackpot invention into mass marketing. This Smith had two kids. He lost them when he went to prison and with his wife dead they would have become wards of the court. They would now be about the same ages as Polozola and Grace.”
Hobbs was practically jumping up and down. “Wait! Hold on. So Polozola and Grace Lowell are brother and sister? That would explain the physical resemblance and how she knew to recruit him. As for finding him, we both know there are a number of ways to do that. But this strawman, Smith … so he’s their father?”
“That’s what I’m thinking. This old bastard is seventy-something, living on a daily diet of amphetamines, vodka, cheese, and Twinkies. Maybe they got him to sign a will, or maybe they just let him die intestate. Either way, who’s going to challenge their right to the estate?”
Hobbs shook his head. “Let me take this around the block. Wife robs her husband of a small fortune and then recruits her long-lost brother to kill him. Then the two of them find their long-lost father and set him up as strawman for their scam to launder the stolen millions. Come on, Holiday, have you been reading too many detective novels?”
“I don’t read detective novels, but we have to go with the theory that Grace Lowell had her husband killed. Killed by Polozola. Assuming Grace is running the show, what is her plan for Polozola? And what sends him packing? And what gets him killed? Was he always expendable and going to be offed at the appropriate time, or was he the weak link? Was he getting antsy and turning into too big of a liability?”
Hobbs raised his hand as if stopping traffic and said, “More likely something happened. Something that made the scam start to come undone. Or made Polozola think it had. No matter what, we’re still back here. We’re still back to why Cortez was killed and how he was involved. It all comes back to the shithouse saloon across the street. You meet Cortez there; Polozola is shot within two blocks of there by the same gun. Both men in a panic and in flight when they got popped. Cortez is in the mix of all this. But how?”
“I think there are a number of things we have to find out before we know how Jesus fits in. But you tell me this: where are we now?”
“We’re at a tipping point. If the scheme was unraveling somehow, just how useful are you anymore? Are you still the fall guy who supposedly set this in motion or are you the next to get your ticket cancelled? Now that Grubb is out of the equation, things might speed up for whatever is planned for you.”
“The real reason you let Grubb walk. Leave me the sole patsy?”
“If you are a patsy. Removing Grubb may tell us, just as it may accelerate things.”
“You’re a devious prick, Hobbs.”
“You’d better hope I’m a devious prick, Holiday, because whoever is pulling the strings here is no slouch.”
The chief of detectives for the Berkeley, California, Police Department let his last statement hang in the air as he took a short sip from his flask. He stared at the floor, then looking me in the eye said, “We still have too many open questions, but one thing we can be sure of: whoever’s running the show doesn’t seem to care how large the final body count has to be.”
Chapter Forty-Three
My head went from the feel of wet sawdust to wet sand and Hobbs shook his flask as if determining if he had enough whiskey to finish our meeting. Apparently he did.
“So what do the files tell us?” he asked impatiently.
“The files are pretty much what Grubb said, from what time I had to look at them. No question this is a scheme. A scheme to launder money based upon the system I started. But—”
“But what?”
“In a number of the contracts it talks about reserving the right to take title in a trust, not about Smith as an individual. It was an irrevocable trust. It was the John Q. Smith Special Needs Trust. But there is no evidence that any deal closed in a trust. None of the properties, per title reports, and public records show a trust in title. And there’s no copy of the trust to tell who the trustee is. If this was part of the scheme, why did they change their minds?”
“Why a trust in the first place?”
“Tax reasons. Probate. Also, maybe more importantly, if cash flow is the endgame, then the trustee controls the cash. Doesn’t have to be at the whim of an alcoholic, schizophrenic, geriatric speed freak.”
“What else does a trust fund suggest?”
“Family.”
“Exactly. Family. Back to the long-lost brother and father theory. Okay, Grace and Polozola are brother and sister. Smith is the father. So we go with this premise. What if what this Muriel says is true—that there are all these stolen diamonds, and your client gets her hands on them. Grace sells them discreetly and slowly. Probably out of the country. Diamonds are an underground currency. And extremely negotiable. She recruits Polozola to start the scam with Smith. Like you say, Grace makes money on the real estate commissions, but the endgame is the property portfolio. If the scam falls apart, she blames Polozola, and if that doesn’t work then she blames you. Or hires you to set you up further. But how does Cortez figure in? Assuming the theory is correct, we still are missing at least two pieces of the puzzle. What about Cortez? Why kill him?” Hobbs paused for a beat. “Muriel. The link to Cortez is Muriel. And we got a problem with her.”
“What problem?”
“We’ll get back to Muriel in a minute, but how did you get to here? Who arranged that? Because the saloon is still part of this.”
We had been through this before, almost from Day One. Hobbs knew my office space was a sublet from the non-profit I had worked for. He knew that that organization was the reason I had moved to California. He told me he had been investigating La Verne Ella Scott-Dixon but had yet to see any connection with her and with any of the players except for me. He was now convinced it had to be another party.
I told him the only other person was David Gass. A long-time acquaintance and colleague who had recommended me to the non-profit. Although I doubted he could be involved in the scam, I gave Hobbs all the vital information I had on Gass.
“After I turn his life inside out, we’ll know if there is a connection. Particularly after I have all the intel back on Grace and Polozola. They were both adopted, so that’s slowed things down.”
&
nbsp; “Those records would be sealed,” I said.
“Two great American misnomers, Holiday: unlisted phone numbers and sealed court records. Also I still haven’t gotten everything back on John Q. Smith. The murders have all been committed with his gun, going back to the Eve Smith homicide. I’d like to know more about that crime, but it seems there wasn’t much of an investigation in the first place. Add to that, the primary detective and his partner are both dead. No real witnesses except the kids. The public defender for John Smith is dead. If there is something there I can’t find a way to find it. I even ran down the prosecutor from the Eve Smith murder. He’s in private practice in Portland, and his office told me that he had no information on the case that the district attorney’s office didn’t have.”
“Jonas Wiesel.”
“Wiesel, yeah. Know him?”
“Yeah, and you’re going to like this. Jonas was Sid Lichtman’s attorney, and not only is he Grace Lowell’s attorney, but he’s the one who recommended me to Grace. And you’re really going to like this: Jonas Wiesel was my attorney. He’s the one who got every one of those indictments against me dismissed.”
“You think he’s a player in this?”
“I think he might be, in an incidental, tangential way. But he’s got all kinds of client privilege to hide behind.”
“If he’s a co-conspirator then privilege goes out the window.”
“I doubt he is. Anyway, Jonas earned his nickname legitimately.”
“Which is?”
“Wiesel the Weasel. He’s not going to tell either one of us anything. Even if he were subpoenaed into court or before a grand jury, Jonas would almost certainly find a way to squash the subpoena or find some legal way to weasel out of saying word one. But back to the Eve Smith murder. I know the place where the murder took place, a trailer park, and I’ll find out if anyone from that time is still there, and if they remember anything. That’s tomorrow. This afternoon I’m flying up to Eugene to see Muriel. She told me she has some letters from Jesus that may be of help.”
“Oh, yeah, Muriel,” Hobbs tipped his flask up and finished what was left. “I was going to tell you that I spoke to her.”
“How’d that go?”
“She gave me a name.”
“What name?”
“Name of her attorney.” Hobbs rose to go, and as he was halfway through the door he announced, “Muriel Lichtman lawyered up.”
Chapter Forty-Four
I don’t wear a necktie much anymore, only when I am having lunch with an international arms dealer or attending the opening night of a new production of a feminist play. I paid the cabby an extra twenty to get me to the theater on time, and I arrived just before the curtain rose for Act One. I found that the comp ticket left for me put me on the aisle in row two. Whatever Muriel had done in the way of advertising had worked: the theater was packed. She was the first actor on the stage, and if she had been stunning wearing sweats and no makeup, now, with her stage makeup and a black dress that fit like a second skin, accentuating her every curve, she was almost breathtaking.
I had trouble focusing on the plot because I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Muriel was like a great tennis player on the court: she owned the stage, and she controlled it the way a skilled boxer cuts the ring in half.
At the conclusion of the play there were two curtain calls, signifying success. A young woman who introduced herself as Jenny, Muriel’s assistant, approached me in the lobby afterwards and gave me the address and conference room name of the Marriott where the after party was being held.
Fifteen minutes later I arrived and found Muriel standing at the podium in the conference room. She still had her stage makeup on and was still wearing the daring black dress. She thanked all her cast and crew and then said, “I have this recurring dream. It takes place one hundred years from now at my alma mater, Smith. Two freshmen are walking past Lichtman Hall, and one asks, ‘Who was Lichtman?’ The other answers, ‘Muriel Lichtman, the writer.’ Her classmate says, ‘Never heard of her. What did she write to get a hall named after her?’ The other student says, ‘She wrote a check.’ ”
There was general laughter all around. She reminded everyone it was an open bar, thanked them again, and stepped down from the podium to applause. At the bar she grabbed two glasses and a just opened bottle of champagne; then, hooking my arm in escort fashion, she whispered in my ear, “Please, get me the fuck out of here.” She smiled at, but otherwise ignored, four or five people who tried to approach her as we exited the hotel.
“Thanks for saving me from the tion people,” she said.
“The who?”
“The tion people. They want a quotation, a donation, validation. They want to tell me about my obligations. All you want is info on a dead priest. And, of course, you want to fuck me.”
“Muriel, what I came for is whatever help you can give me regarding who killed Jesus.”
We walked down a street of small shops and boutiques. The moon was waxing and nearly full on this warm summer night. I declined a drink of champagne, so Muriel tossed away the two glasses she was carrying and drank straight from the bottle. I hadn’t seen a bullet snuffer in quite some time, but she pulled the small device out of her purse and offered me a snort of cocaine. I declined that, too, and she took two long pulls on the snuffer. Then she grabbed me by the arm and stopped me in the middle of the sidewalk.
“Oh grow up!” she said in a spot-on imitation of comedienne Joan Rivers. “Can we talk? Everyone wants to fuck me. Men and women. Boys and girls. Even zoo animals want to fuck me.” She laughed. “Why not just tell the truth? Why not just say, ‘Muriel, I’d like to fuck you?’ ”
I moved just out of her reach. “First of all, because that’s not why I’m here. And secondly, I don’t talk to women that way.”
“What are you? The last of the real gentlemen, Jack?”
“I guess I’m what passes for a gentleman these days. And I like to be called Jackson, not Jack.”
“You know what I like, Jackson?” she asked as she grabbed my necktie and pulled me close to her face. “I like men who come with their own leashes.” She kissed me with a great deal of tongue and suddenly bit into my lower lip. Hard. She held a continuous bite until the inside of my mouth filled with blood. I gurgled for her to stop but she wouldn’t. Finally I grabbed her by the hair and pulled until she let go. She went reeling backward, dropping her bullet snuffer and spilling champagne but not dropping the bottle. She nearly fell over until she grabbed a parking meter.
“God, I haven’t had my hair pulled like that in a long time,” she gasped.
“I’m sorry,” I said, gingerly touching my lip. “It’s just—”
“Don’t apologize. It arouses me.” She bent over to pick up her snuffer, then she walked over, and standing very close to me, looked up and said in a sensuous tone, “I hope you’re not one of those guys who thinks that just because a woman likes it a little rough, she’s not romantically and emotionally available.”
I didn’t know whether Muriel was putting me on or not, and strangely I didn’t really care.
“I’m much more enlightened than that,” I said, smiling. “But while I don’t know if they should name a hall at Smith after you, I’m certain that they should name a drink after you.”
“They already have. It’s called an Orgasm. Equal parts Amaretto, Bailey’s Irish Cream, and Kahlúa.” She laughed, a full, throaty sound. “Which brings us back to the subject at hand: back to fucking me. You know you can, if you play your cards right, Doc.”
Doc?
We came upon a small city park with a fountain, and took a bench. The small square was empty except for a flock of pigeons scavenging in the moonlight.
“I know who you are, Doc Holiday,” she continued. “Not only a notorious white collar criminal, but one who took the money and ran. And got away with it.” Muriel took a long pull out of the champagne bottle, looked at me and smiled. “A famous white collar criminal. I think it’s sex
y,” she said.
“Sexy as biting and hair-pulling?” I asked, wondering just what didn’t arouse her. I was beginning to think that Muriel probably had fetishes that hadn’t yet been catalogued.
“It’s up there,” Muriel giggled, as she took another long snort of cocaine and another drink of champagne. “You seem rather a literary person. Do you know Nelson Algren?”
“Man with the Golden Arm?”
“Yes. Did you know he had an affair with Simone De Beauvoir?”
“No. I didn’t think she liked America or Americans.”
“She didn’t much. But she liked men. Lots of men, as well as amphetamines and alcohol. By all accounts, when she wasn’t being one of the most important intellectuals of the twentieth century, Simone was a fun girl on a date. Of all the men in her life, even including Sartre, she probably most loved Nelson Algren.” She paused. “In his book A Walk on the Wild Side, he had these three rules for living.”
“Yes, I remember, but I don’t really recall them, except one. I think Number one is, ‘don’t frequent a café named Mama’s.’ ”
“And his second rule of life,” said Muriel, “Was something like ‘don’t sit down at a poker table with a guy named Doc.’ ”
She stood on the tips of her toes and gently ran her tongue across my damaged lip. In a breathy tone she whispered in my ear, “I want to play with a man named Doc. I wanna take a walk on the wild side.” She began singing the Lou Reed rock classic, pushing her hands palms up into the air and undulating her hips provocatively. She pirouetted and stood in front of me.
As I rose I took two steps and stumbled.
“It’s vertigo,” said Muriel, “brought on by the combination of my pheromones and Chanel Number Five. It happens to all men. But don’t worry, it hasn’t proven fatal.” She laughed and added, “Yet.”
Once again I couldn’t tell if Muriel was serious. And once again I didn’t care.
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