The Conan Flagg Mysteries: Bundle #3

by M. K. Wren

  “It’s his only hope for recovering his money, and he’s keeping a fairly tight rein on Jonas. I overheard a phone conversation yesterday. Jonas was talking to Belasco, and what he said makes sense if you assume Jonas has a schedule for checking in with his boss. Probably three or four times a day, and if Jonas doesn’t check in on time, Belasco can call in the police, and they’d probably call in the FBI, since Jonas crossed a few state lines. I think Jonas will try his damnedest to replace the money before taking a chance on a long prison sentence. Did Carl check the NCIC files?”

  “He didn’t, but I’ve got a buddy with the SFPD. No, Jonas doesn’t have a prison record.”

  “And I doubt he wants to acquire one at his age. Damn, I wish I had some idea how much he owes Belasco.”

  “If he owes him. I guess you could call Belasco.”

  Conan smiled at that. “I can think of better ways to waste my time. What did Carl find out about Jonas’s health?”

  “He seems to be in great shape. That’s according to Marie. There weren’t any bills from doctors or hospitals in his apartment. Carl checked all the hospitals in Phoenix, and Jonas isn’t on record with any of them.”

  “At least Corey didn’t quite fall for that scam.” Then he frowned, reached for his cigarette. If Corey had fallen for it, she might still be alive.

  “Conan, who’s Corey?”

  “She…she was a friend of mine.”

  “Was? I thought you wanted all this information just out of curiosity.”

  He squinted through an exhalation of smoke. “The situation has changed. Anything else on Jonas?”

  “Not unless I missed something. I’ll send the file—both of them—by messenger service. Should get to you tomorrow. So, now we come to Nina Gillies. Yes, I assigned Sean Kelly to her. Sean sends her love, by the way, and wants to know when you’re coming down to San Francisco. She says you’re going to mildew up there.”

  Conan smiled, and he had a clear image of Sean, red-haired and vivacious, with her intriguing, husky voice.

  “Tell her she’s my one and only wild Irish rose.”

  “Sure. Now, if we’ve got the blarney out of the way…Sean, bless her efficient little heart, typed up a summary herself. I’ll read it to you. A lot of her information came from the morgues of the LA Times and assorted scandal sheets. She photocopied some of the clippings. Damn, Nina Gillies is one gorgeous woman. Or was, anyway.”

  “She’s still gorgeous, Charlie. But as Miss Dobie always says, beauty is only—”

  “Sure it is. You want to hear this thing?”

  “Read on, Macduff.”

  “Okay, Sean picked up Nina’s story about the time she came to California: ‘In 1966, Nina Gillies, an ex-Miss Oregon, married Randall (Randy) Coburn, an All-America quarterback for the University of Oregon. He graduated that year and signed a contract with the LA Rams. Nina Coburn (she took back her maiden name after Randy died in 1975) signed up with a prestigious Hollywood talent agency. For two years they were Hollywood’s storybook couple. Lots of clippings from this period and photos of Prince and Princess Charming with some very famous and important people. They spent money like water off a duck’s back—’” Charlie had to stop for a laugh at that. “Conan, I’m just reading what Sean has here. Okay. ‘But the fairy tale ended unhappily in 1968 when Randy was implicated in a big drug scandal. He was never prosecuted, but the Rams dropped him. Nina’s film career never got off first base. She did a few TV commercials and two small parts in movies, but that’s all. Her agent dropped her about the same time the Rams dropped Randy. After that they didn’t show up in the papers except in the back pages under court cases. LAPD had a long file on Randy. He was picked up a few times on suspicion of drug dealing—no convictions—and he had a string of DUIs. He tried acting as Nina’s agent for a while, but the best he could do for her was starring roles in porno movies. Randy also had a habit of occasionally beating Nina into a hospital.

  “‘But Nina wasn’t exactly being dragged along on this downhill roller coaster. Her father ran a successful contracting business in Portland, and he regularly sent her money and begged her to leave Randy and come home. She refused. In 1975, her father died, and her mother sold everything and went to live with a sister in Springfield, Missouri. At the time of her father’s death, Nina was in the hospital again, thanks to Randy. This time she decided she’d had enough. She sued for divorce, got an injunction against him, and filed an assault charge. He was out on bail the next day. By then, Nina was out of the hospital and staying with a friend, Carla Henried. The day after Randy got out on bail, he was found in an alley, dead, shot with a small caliber handgun. The alley was about two blocks from Carla Henried’s house, where Nina was hiding out. Long finger of coincidence. Carla swore that she and Nina were at a movie the night of the murder. Since Randy was shot in the back of the head, execution style, the police decided the killer was probably one of his friends in the drug business. Nina was questioned and released. The case is still open.

  “‘Nina sank out of sight for the next five years, and when she came up, she was a new woman. She apparently did it all on her own, working days in a department store, going to business school at night, and spending whatever free time she had getting in shape physically at the YWCA. Later she studied for a real estate agent’s license, and when she got that, she went to see Isaac Wines. She first met him back in the Cinderella years. He hired her to work in one of his real estate offices, then when she got her broker’s license, he put her in charge of it. He liked her work, and at this point, she’s sort of his right hand lady in real estate. And maybe in other places, too, but that’s just raw insinuation and comes from Wines’s personal secretary, Velma Logan. She doesn’t seem to care much for Nina, but she does like martinis. According to her, Wines loaned Nina one hundred thousand dollars to set up her own agency in Holliday Beach. Her main objective was to acquire the land for the Baysea Properties development, and if she succeeded, he’d forget the loan, plus she’d collect a ten percent broker’s fee, plus a four hundred thousand dollar bonus from Wines. Velma wasn’t sure what would happen if Nina didn’t succeed, but she said it wasn’t likely that Nina would ever work in the real estate business again. Then there’s that loan, of course. And I found another interesting facet on all this. Wines hired a new receptionist for his office in LA about a year ago: Carla Henried, Nina’s old friend—the one who gave her an alibi for Randy’s murder. I didn’t have time for an in-depth on Carla, but judging by her car, her address, and her mink, receptionists are doing very well these days. Carla isn’t being kept so nicely for her good looks, by the way; she’s no ranting beauty, and Isaac Wines is a connoisseur.

  “‘That’s the gist of it. Details and sources follow. Also a transcript of a call to Nina’s mother in Missouri. As far as she’s concerned, Nina died with her father. Conan, when are you going to take me away from all this?’”

  Conan, his train of thought abruptly derailed, had to laugh at that. “Charlie, I’ll answer that question personally—and privately.”

  “Yeah, I figured you would. Okay, anything she didn’t cover?”

  Conan took a puff on his cigarette. “No, she covered everything very well. As usual. Damn, the story of Nina’s life would make a movie, even if she could never land a starring role while she was in Hollywood.”

  “Right. From the top to the bottom and back again.”

  Conan thought about that arduous ascent from the depths. No one who made that climb would relish repeating it. And at the top of Nina’s mountain, Isaac Wines apparently stood smiling, offering a glittering future in one hand, and in the other, disaster in the shape of a loan Nina could never repay, a career in shambles, and—

  What about Carla Henried? Was she being kept so well as a potential witness to a murder that the Los Angeles police still considered an open case?

  Nina was perhaps involved in a very high stakes game.

  “Conan? You still there?”

  “Mm? Yes, Ch
arlie. You’d better send the reports to the bookshop. I won’t be at home much tomorrow.”

  “You need any help up there? Anything I can do?”

  Conan considered that, then with a long sigh, “No, I’m afraid not. But thanks. And tell Sean and Carl I appreciate the good work.”

  “I’ll tell them. Okay, Conan, I hope your Irish luck comes through for you.”

  “So do I. Thanks, Charlie.”

  When he hung up, Conan went to the kitchen for a hot cup of coffee and on his return, stood for a while at the windows looking up at the whisps of cirrus clouds brushing the sky. At length, he returned to his desk. His next call went to the local office of the telephone company.

  He asked for Joanie Dann and was instructed to hold. Then, after a full minute’s wait, “Joanie, this is Conan. I have a favor to ask of you, and it’s in a very good cause.”

  The voice sounded younger than its possessor. She laughed and retorted, “And very illegal?”

  “For a PI, yes. But it’s also very important.”

  “Why?”

  Conan’s mouth tightened. “It’s confidential.”

  “Don’t you trust me, Conan?”

  “Don’t you trust me?”

  “More or less. Okay, what is it this time?”

  “Can you find out if any long-distance calls have been made from Gabe Benbow’s house since last Thursday?”

  “Oh, probably, if I get old Jenny here working on it.”

  “Jenny” was a computer, and Joanie and Jenny enjoyed a close relationship.

  “I’ll take you to dinner at the finest restaurant on the coast, Joanie. Anywhere you want to go. And I’ll throw in a magnum of Mumm’s, if you get that information to me before—say, eleven o’clock.”

  That brought on another laugh. “Okay, Conan, the Cote d’Azur in Westport, and forget the Mumm’s. Make it a fifth of Glenlivet.”

  “You’re on.”

  “No, I’m off—my rocker. Oh—where are you?”

  “At home.”

  “Oh, yes, it’s Monday. Bookshop’s closed. Okay, I’ll talk to you later.”

  Conan spent the next half hour replaying the tape from his call to Duncan and adding more notes to the legal pad. Motive. All he had was motive, he thought bitterly. Everyone at Gabe’s house Friday night had motive. The tape ended, and Conan had begun skimming his notes from the day before, when the phone rang. It was Joanie Dann.

  “Okay, Conan, I’ve got what you wanted. Ready?”

  He was poised with pen in hand. “Let’s have it.”

  “On Thursday there was one call to Westport, 579-1086, and two to Phoenix, Arizona, both to 973-6800. Then Friday, another call to the same Westport number and…let’s see, three calls to Phoenix, one to 973-6800—oh, that’s the same number as Thursday—and two to 973-7303. On Saturday, the Westport number again, and four Phoenix calls, all to that first number. Yesterday—this is getting monotonous—one to the Westport number, and three to Phoenix, first number again. And that’s all I could get for you.”

  Conan was smiling broadly as he wrote. “That’s all? Joanie, you’re wonderful. What was the billing on the calls?”

  “Let’s see, the Westport calls were direct dial. The Phoenix calls were all person-to-person collect.”

  “Which means operator assistance. Beautiful.” That way, Belasco could ascertain from the operator the point of origin of the calls to make sure Jonas was still where he claimed to be. “But I wish you could give me the times.”

  “Conan, you can’t have everything. You owe me a quarter, by the way, for this call. I didn’t dare risk anybody in the office overhearing all this.”

  Conan laughed. “You’ll get your quarter back, Joanie. Thanks for the information—and it is in a good cause.”

  “I know. Oh—give me a little warning before this night on the town so I can get my hair fixed.”

  “All right, but how can one ‘fix’ perfection? Take care, Joanie.”

  Conan impatiently pressed the cradle button, then called Directory Assistance. A few minutes later, he had verified two assumptions: the Westport number was the residence of Leonard Moskin; the Phoenix numbers were for the office of Southwestern Investment Company and the home of Harvey Belasco.

  Did that also verify the hypothesis that Jonas had again indulged in embezzlement, that Belasco let him return to Oregon to acquire the money to repay what he had stolen, and that the frequent calls to Phoenix were Belasco’s way of keeping track of Jonas? Conan tried to imagine another hypothesis that would explain the facts as well, when the phone rang, startling him. He snatched up the receiver. “Yes?”

  “Flagg, this is Earl Kleber.”

  “Oh—yes, Chief, what can I do for you?” He asked the question warily; Kleber’s use of Conan’s first or last name was a fairly dependable barometer of his mood.

  “I just got a call from a buddy of mine in the Forest Service. Yesterday evening, he was running a routine patrol on a logging road up the Sitka River, and he spotted a guy on a motorcycle.”

  Conan asked with some foreboding, “Spotted him doing what?”

  “Nothing right then. Jerry flagged him down, and the guy stopped. No problem. The name on his driver’s license was Lyndon B. Hatch. He’s a friend of yours, isn’t he?”

  Conan’s foreboding hadn’t lessened. “Yes. Why did Jerry flag him down?”

  “Because he was carrying a rifle, that’s why, and it’s a long time past hunting season. Jerry said it looked brand new—a Remington thirty-ought-six with a Leupold three by nine scope.”

  Conan closed his eyes wearily. “What did Lyn say?”

  “Told Jerry he was just camping out and heard there’d been bear sighted around there. Flagg, nobody’s seen any bear up the Sitka for years.”

  “What did Jerry do about him?”

  Kleber snorted. “What could he do? Nothing. Told him the law on poaching deer and went on about his business. So, what do you know about it? What’s Hatch up to?”

  Conan replied irritably, “I don’t know, Chief, nor do I know why you think he’s up to anything. Maybe he just has a phobia about bears.”

  “Sure. Hatch was a friend of Corey’s, too, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes, he was.”

  Kleber paused, then, “Does Hatch agree with you about Corey—that maybe she didn’t die accidentally?”

  “Chief, I am not telepathic.”

  Kleber laughed. “Okay, Conan. Just thought you’d like to know about this. Any luck with your investigation?”

  Conan looked down at the mute hieroglyphics of his notes. “Nothing that would stand up in court so far, but the game’s not over yet.”

  “Right, but you’re getting into the fourth quarter if you’re playing for an autopsy. The funeral’s tomorrow. I called Ronson. He says he’ll take care of the cremation this afternoon.”

  Conan stopped himself from looking at his watch, but time seemed to be piling up on him. He said grimly, “I’m trying for a field goal. I’m having lunch with Dr. Feingold. Chief, if you hear anything more about Lyn—”

  “Yeah, I’ll let you know.”

  Chapter 12

  Conan arrived at the Surf House dining room in time to procure a table by the windows overlooking the beach and to enjoy a brief conversation with the proprietors, Tilda and Brian Tally, before the lunch rush drove Brian back into the kitchen, and Tilda resumed her duties as hostess, gracious and graceful as ever, despite the obvious fact of her pregnancy. It became her, Conan thought, and at least this was one child who would be cherished.

  He watched the lace-patterned scallops of the waves sliding in over the sand, then sliding back to meet the next wave in a brown flurry, scouring the sand smooth for yet another wave. It was nearly twelve-thirty when Tilda came to his table and presented a young man with a plethora of dark, curly hair, rimless glasses saddling a nose of noble proportions, and an ingenuous smile. “Greg Feingold,” he said, thrusting out a hand. “Sorry I’m late. You’re Conan Fl
agg. Right, of course you are. That nice lady—where’d she go? Beautiful woman. Wonder if she’s—well, I guess she must be married. Or something. I hope so, anyway. Mind if I sit down?”

  Conan had had his mouth open to offer that invitation for some time, and now he got in a hurried, “Please do sit down, Dr. Feingold. Would you like a cocktail or—”

  “Mm? Oh, no, thanks. Maybe wine with lunch. Call me Greg.” As he spoke, he searched the pockets of his worn, corduroy blazer; at length, he came up with a pack of cigarettes. “Bother you if I smoke? Oh—you’ve got the habit too. Damn, I’m going to quit someday. You’d think I’d seen enough lungs…” He lighted a cigarette and let smoke out with a long sigh. “What’s good for lunch here?”

  Conan found himself smiling. “Almost anything. I’ll have Tilda bring menus—”

  “No, you don’t need to. You eat here a lot? Why don’t you order. Damn, what a view. Just look at that!”

  Conan instead concentrated on attracting the attention of a waitress and ordering lunch: the specialty of the house, petrale sole stuffed with Dungeness crab. “And a bottle of Adelsheim Sauvignon Blanc. Anything else, Doctor?”

  “Mm? Oh, no. That sounds great.” And when the waitress departed, “I really prefer ‘Greg.’ Never have gotten used to that ‘doctor.’ You said you wanted to talk about the Benbow case. What—well, I was wondering…”

  “What business is it of mine?” Conan nodded. “By the way, if you prefer a first name basis, make it mutual. As for Corey Benbow, she was a friend of mine, and there’s more to her death than meets the eye.” He paused for a puff on his cigarette, trying to gauge Feingold’s response. So far, he seemed only mildly curious. “Greg, my first question is, why wasn’t a full autopsy done?”

  Feingold shrugged. “It was just a routine accident case, and the cause of death was obvious. If it hadn’t been, sure, I’d have done a full autopsy.”

  “If this was such a routine case, why were you asked to do the examination on a Saturday? What was the rush?”

  “It’s not so unusual, actually, for me to work on weekends. But this—well, I guess it could’ve waited till today. Local mortuary had adequate cold-storage facilities. But Owen called me early Saturday morning and asked me to take care of it.”