Schemers nd-34

by Bill Pronzini

  “County tax records and MapQuest-no problem.”

  “I’ve got my laptop. E-mail the info and I’ll pick it up when I get to a motel.”

  12

  Julian Iverson lived in Pacific Heights not far from my old apartment, but three streets higher-a much more rarified atmosphere. My place had been four rooms in a venerable, rent-controlled building with a snippet of a view from one bay window; Iverson’s condo was on the fourth floor of a newly renovated low-rise, had seven rooms and unobstructed views of the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz, and had probably cost him a couple of million dollars.

  Three of the interior rooms were partially walled with books, less than half as many as Pollexfen had accumulated, but they weren’t Iverson’s only interest. He also had a taste for antique furniture, paintings, etchings, and other artwork, and Oriental carpets-rare Sarouks, a fact I wouldn’t have known if he hadn’t made a point of saying so. More proud of the carpets, it seemed, than his books. All he said about the collection, with a casual sweeping gesture as we entered, was, “Children’s literature and fine bindings. My specialty.”

  He was seventy, but he could have passed for fifty-five or so. Lean, fit, his face smooth, his hair still thick and dark except for threads of gray. He’d been accommodating on the phone: “Greg told me to expect a call from you. Come by any time.” He was just as accommodating in person, soft-spoken and cordial. We did our talking in a room dominated by fine bindings and half a dozen tasteful paintings of nudes in bucolic settings.

  “How long have you known Gregory Pollexfen, Mr. Iverson?”

  “Nearly thirty years. We met at an ABAA book fair.”

  “Close friends, then?”

  “I wouldn’t say that. We’re both avid bibliophiles-that’s the basis for our friendship. We have little else in common.”

  “So you don’t socialize?”

  “No. He comes here and I visit him at his home, to talk books. I’m a widower, you see.”

  A fact I already knew from Tamara’s research. I nodded and said, “Your collecting interests are quite a bit different.”

  “True, but our passion for first editions is what drew us together and keeps the friendship alive. Greg may collect nothing but crime fiction, but his knowledge and interest exceed his specialty. As do mine.”

  “How would you characterize the man?”

  Iverson smiled. “Passionate, as I said. Intense. Competitive. Generous when it suits him.”

  “His wife considers him manipulative.”

  “Does she? Well, she’s probably right. I’ve known him to be devious and scheming when he lusted after a particular book.”

  “Would you say he’s honest?”

  “Are you asking if I think it’s possible he filed a false theft report and a false insurance claim?”

  “Indirectly, yes.”

  “Anything is possible,” Iverson said.

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “No, I suppose it isn’t. Let me put it this way. If Greg had a compelling reason for pretending some of his most valuable collectibles had been stolen in order to bilk half a million dollars from his insurance company, then the honest answer is yes, he might well be capable of it.”

  “But you don’t think that’s the case.”

  “No, I don’t. He doesn’t need the money, God knows. And I can’t think of any other reason why he would fake the theft. He cares too much about his books to want to jeopardize prize items like the Hammetts and Doyle in any way.”

  “If they were stolen, then, who would you say is the most likely candidate?”

  “I wouldn’t. Other than it would have to be someone with access to both his house and library. And to the library key.”

  “Even though he keeps the key close to him day and night.”

  “I’ve been in that room several times. There’s simply no way anyone could get in and out without one.”

  “His wife or his brother-in-law, then.”

  “That would seem to be the case.”

  “What can you tell me about Mrs. Pollexfen?”

  “Very little, I’m afraid. We don’t socialize, as I told you. I’ve only spoken to the woman a few times.”

  “Your impression of her?”

  His smile, this time, was slightly bent. “I wouldn’t care to say.”

  “What about Jeremy Cullrane?”

  “The same. I barely know the man.”

  “Mr. Pollexfen considers him the prime suspect.”

  “Well, Greg is in a position to make that judgment.”

  “I understand Cullrane lost a large amount of money in a promotional scheme that backfired a few years ago. Music show at the San Jose Auditorium. Would you happen to know if Pollexfen was involved in that?”

  “No, I wouldn’t. We don’t discuss business or personal matters, his or mine.”

  “Only books?”

  “Only books.”

  “Assuming the eight volumes were stolen by someone other than Pollexfen, how likely is it that they’ll turn up on the collectors’ market?”

  “Not very, I’m afraid,” Iverson said. “Rare first editions in dust wrapper, in fine or near fine condition, are seldom offered for sale these days. Personal inscriptions are, of course, unique-especially those of an associational nature.”

  “By associational you mean books inscribed to fellow writers.”

  “Correct. Greg has notified all the reputable dealers and collectors in his field. If any of the missing items were to be brought to them, they would be instantly recognizable and the thief easily caught. Anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of first editions would understand this.”

  “So he or she would attempt to sell them to an unscrupulous dealer or collector.”

  “Of which, I’m sorry to say, there are many.”

  “How easy would it be for a noncollector to find someone like that? Someone with enough money to afford to buy stolen first editions?”

  “Moderately difficult, but by no means impossible,” Iverson said. “Any sort of inquiry would have to be done sub rosa, of course, to avoid word leaking out. But a buyer could be found. And a price arranged before the books were actually taken.”

  All of which pretty much confirmed what Pollexfen had told me. Nothing new here, no insights or potential leads. Pollexfen, his wife, his brother-in-law… one of them had to be reponsible. But without either a clear-cut motive or answers to the questions of access and disposability, how to determine which one?

  I got my crack at Jeremy Cullrane later that afternoon. After I left Iverson, I checked for callback messages and there weren’t any. So I made follow-up calls to his contact numbers, and the one to Nicole Coyne’s apartment paid off. She was there and so was Cullrane. She put him on the line and he said casually, “Oh, I got your messages. Just haven’t had time to get back to you.”

  Meaning he didn’t think it was important enough to bother. Meaning I wasn’t going to like him any more than either of the Pollexfens did.

  I prodded him until he agreed to let me come there “and get this damn nonsense over with.” Nicole Coyne’s apartment building was on Powell across from the North Beach playground; I found a place to park after twenty minutes of frustrated hunting, waited to be admitted to the building with an edge on my temper, and was greeted by boredom on the Coyne woman’s part and sneering indifference on Cullrane’s.

  They were some pair, the low kind you’d rather discard than draw two. She was one of those slinky types, dark in a way that suggested Latin blood, sloe-eyed and exuding sexuality. Self-involved, though. She looked right through me, as she would any man who didn’t have something to offer her, professionally, monetarily, or physically. He was tall and rangy and long-armed, blond like his sister, with the kind of elongated, knobby features that border on ugliness and some women find appealing. His charm was all superficial-the bullshit variety. So was the aura of superiority he projected. Unlikable, all right. More so every minute I spent with him.

&
nbsp; The apartment was cluttered and reflective of Nicole Coyne’s profession and personality: piano, recording equipment, show posters and blown-up photographs of live performances that featured her. A liberally stocked wet bar stood at one wall. The two of them had glasses in their hands when I came in, and judging from their eyes and faintly flushed cheeks, they’d been at it for a while. No slurred words or motor impairment, though. Hard drinkers, like Angelina Pollexfen.

  The Coyne woman sat at the piano, noodling with the keys, alternately sipping her drink and humming to herself, while Cullrane and I had our little talk. Nobody had asked me to sit down, but I wouldn’t have anyway because he stayed on his feet the whole time, leaning indolently against the wet bar so he had easy access to the bottle of single-malt scotch on its top.

  “Did Greg tell you I stole his damn books? Well, I didn’t. As if I give a shit about a lot of old mystery novels.”

  “Valuable old mystery novels,” I said. “Half a million dollars’ worth.”

  “Oh, I’d love to have a half million. Who wouldn’t? But I couldn’t’ve gotten at them if I’d wanted to. He guards them like the gold in Fort Knox.”

  “Somebody got to them.”

  “Did they? Who?”

  “How about your sister?”

  He laughed. “Angelina isn’t smart enough to plan a trip to the hairdresser’s, much less a theft from a locked library. She’s too busy cuckholding her husband.”

  “She doesn’t speak highly of you, either,” I said.

  “She’s a lush and a tramp and a liar, among other things.”

  “Not exactly warm and fuzzy siblings, are you.”

  “Brilliant deduction.”

  “Why the antipathy?”

  “Chalk it up to differences of opinion.”

  “Before or after you moved in with her and Pollexfen?”

  “That, my friend, is none of your business.”

  I watched him pour more scotch into his glass, nuzzle a little of it. “So what do you think happened to the missing books?”

  “Obvious, isn’t it? Greg spirited them away and hid them somewhere.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “Why do you think?”

  “The half million insurance? According to his financial records, he’s worth twenty times that much.”

  “Most of which is tied up in one way or another,” Cullrane said. “Maybe he’s got a deal cooking that requires cash.”

  “What kind of deal?”

  “How should I know? The man’s been known to take a flyer now and then.”

  “Like he did with you on the San Jose Auditorium show?”

  A scowl turned Cullrane’s knobby face even uglier. “What do you know about that?”

  “The deal fell through and you lost a bundle. Pollexfen’s money, wasn’t it?”

  “What if it was?”

  “He doesn’t like you and you don’t like him. How’d you talk him into investing a hundred thousand in one of your promotions?”

  “It wasn’t all his goddamn money.” Down went the rest of the scotch; the bottle clinked on glass as he replaced it. “I lost some of mine, too. And it wasn’t my fault the deal went sour, no matter what anybody told you.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “What question?”

  “How you managed to talk him into making the investment.”

  “What makes you think I talked him into it?”

  “He volunteered, then? Or was it his idea in the first place?”

  “I didn’t say that, either.”

  “You’re not being very cooperative, Mr. Cullrane.”

  “Why the hell should I be?” he said. “My financial arrangements with Greg Pollexfen are my affair.”

  “They are unless they have a bearing on the case I’m investigating.”

  “Christ, man, I told you-Greg took the fucking books, nobody else. And you can bet he had a good reason. He never does anything without what he thinks is a damn good reason.”

  “Is that right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “But you don’t have a clue what the reason might be.”

  “Also right. He’s a schemer, you’re a private eye. If you’re smarter than he is, you’ll figure it out like Mickey Spillane.”

  Nicole Coyne heard that and found it amusing. Not because she knew Mickey Spillane had been a writer, not a private eye, but because she was tight. Her laugh was low and throaty. “My glass is empty, Jeremy,” she said.

  He got up immediately with the scotch bottle. When he came back to the bar, he said to me, “You finished now? Nicole and I have an appointment for drinks at five o’clock.”

  He didn’t seem to see the irony in that statement and I didn’t enlighten him. “For the time being,” I said.

  “I’ve answered all the questions I’m going to,” he said. “You come around again, you’ll find me in my mime suit.”

  The Coyne woman thought that was hilarious. She was still laughing when I let myself out.

  F rustrating damn case. No matter who I talked to or what information I came up with, I couldn’t seem to move off square one. Some sort of crime had been or was being perpetrated here, but what kind? Theft? Insurance fraud? Filing a false police report for an unknown purpose?

  Any of the three principals could be responsible. Pollexfen was reputedly devious, manipulative, and ruthless. Jeremy Cullrane and Angelina Pollexfen were money-grubbing alcoholics with secrets and manipulative behavior patterns of their own. None of the trio liked one another; accusations flew back and forth, none backed by solid evidence. Pollexfen had the means and opportunity to steal his own books, but no apparent motive. His wife and her brother had opportunity and motive, but no apparent means. Brenda Koehler? Opportunity, but no means and no apparent motive, given her spotless history and simple lifestyle. Julian Iverson? Neither means nor opportunity nor motive.

  There was nothing to catch hold of, to follow through to a definite conclusion. One big confusing tangle of possibilities, half-truths, lies, secrets.

  Where to go from here? The only option, unless Tamara uncovered something new, was for me to start over again: another visit to the Pollexfen house, to ask more questions, have another look around the library and maybe the rest of the place this time. If that didn’t produce a lead, then another crack at the wife and her brother and Brenda Koehler-push them, play a little bad cop. And if that failed… quit beating my head against the wall, admit defeat, and file a report that would effectively approve Pollexfen’s claim.

  It would also prove Barney Rivera right and make him happy as hell, even if it cost Great Western Insurance the half-million-dollar bundle. The needle would come out, long and sharp, and he’d find ways to keep jabbing it into me for a long time afterward. The prospect was galling.

  13

  TAMARA

  On the way home after work she detoured to Home Depot and bought some shelving, shelf paper, and a few other hardware items. The new crib on Connecticut on Potrero Hill had come furnished, but there were things that needed to be done to make it her own. She expected to be there awhile, and the small alterations she planned were the kind that would make any landlord smile.

  The flat took up the second floor of a two-story Stick Victorian that’d been renovated and repainted four years ago. Two bedrooms, two bathrooms, kitchen, laundry room, high-ceilinged living room big enough to hold a dance party in. Good old San Francisco neighborhood, businesses and restaurants within walking distance-uphill from the flat so she could get plenty of exercise when she felt like it. Hefty rent, but not high enough to put a strain on the salary she drew from the agency. On the rental market just a few days when she looked at it. Pure luck no one else had snapped it up. She’d signed the lease on the spot.

  The phone rang about two minutes after she let herself in. Probably Vonda. They hadn’t talked since the weekend before last, when Vonda and Ben helped her move her stuff from the old apartment on 27th Avenue. Me
ant to call her last night, brag a little on Lucas and the solving of her little problem, but one thing and another had kept her from doing it. Young ho stuff, anyhow, bragging on getting laid. Vonda was married and five months’ pregnant and all wrapped up in Ben and the baby. No more goodnatured competition between them like there had been in their badass days. All grown up and respectable now. More or less.

  Still, she’d probably have thrown out some details if it were Vonda on the phone. Only it wasn’t. It was Lucas.

  The sound of his voice put a smile on her mouth. When he left on Monday morning he’d said he would call, and she’d been hoping he would, that he wasn’t just talking the usual man talk after bed games. But hey, this soon? All right!

  “Thought I’d see how you’re doing,” he said.

  “Doing fine. How about you?”

  “The same. Any plans for tonight?”

  “Put up some shelves, that’s about all.”

  “I could come over and give you a hand.”

  Uh-huh. Give her a hand right into bed. The thought brought back memories of Sunday night and yesterday morning, and the prospect of a repeat performance or two made her tingle. “I wouldn’t mind,” she said.

  “You eaten yet?”

  “Not yet.”

  “How about I bring something with me? Pizza, Chinese takeout, whatever you’d like.”

  “Chinese sounds good.”

  “Any dish you’re partial to?”

  “Nope, I like it all. Surprise me.”

  “That’s me at your door, in about an hour.”

  She put the phone down, still smiling, still tingling. Oh, Lordy, that man was good in bed. Better than Horace, she thought with a little satisfied malice. Better than anybody she could remember. He must’ve felt the same about her, wanting to come back for more this soon.

  Sex was all it was, though. Each of them scratching itches. That was what she’d told Bill and that was the way it was. What she felt for Lucas was all below the neck. He said it was the same for him and she hoped he meant it. Last thing she needed in her life right now was another heavy relationship like she’d had with Horace. Love wasn’t any big deal anyway. Overrated. Too many complications, too much chance of getting hurt again. Uh-uh. No, thank you.