by Ken Brigham
Chapter 17
The Metropolitan Nashville chief of police was a product of the new school of policing. Although he had put in the obligatory minimum amount of time on the streets, he was never really a cop like Hardy Seltzer was a cop. He held a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Syracuse and an advanced degree in criminal justice from John Jay College, where his thesis was titled Organization and Implementation of a Service-Oriented Department of Justice in a Medium Size American City. The job he landed in Nashville was, he thought, precisely in his intellectual sweet spot. His chance to convert theory to practice. When offered the job by the Nashville mayor, he leapt at the chance.
So, while Chief James Horner was intellectually well prepared for the job he held, it was not a good fit emotionally. Horner was insecure and depended mostly on the opinions of others for his sense of self-worth. The political pressures in the Nashville job were inordinate. No doubt there was something in his history that explained his insecurity, something like a dominant father, unloving mother, who knows what, but Chief Horner was, for whatever reason, constantly pinballed around by the politicians, making him a nearly insufferable micromanager. To complicate the matter, most of the handful of managerial types that he brought with him, people whom he had connected with at John Jay, shared his personality flaws. Assistant Chief Carl Goetz, head of the criminal investigations division and immediate supervisor of Hardy Seltzer, was no exception. Hardy avoided all of his superiors as much as he could.
But, he had to deal with the Bechman Fitzwallington situation, Hardy thought, mano-a-mano. Thus, they sat facing each other across the Assistant Chief’s large oak desk. Each man was affecting body language meant to establish a dominant position in the impending conversation.
Hardy leaned forward, his elbows planted firmly on the desk and looked directly into the chief’s eyes.
“Assistant Chief Goetz,” Seltzer said, “we have to open a wide door on this Fitzwallington thing. Open a serious investigation. We have a dead cop, shot dead in the old artist’s front yard in broad daylight. Granted the perp was apparently demented, but why there?”
“Maybe coincidence,” Goetz replied, avoiding Seltzer’s attempt to engage his eyes. “There are such things, you know.”
Goetz leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. He was not a large man, and his efforts to assume postures that would expand his persona generally didn’t work very well. This one didn’t.
Hardy leaned in even further toward his boss and said, “Coincidences are lazy excuses for faulty investigations. Give me a week. Let me pull at some threads and see if a story unravels.”
“Not sure you understand how sensitive this is, Seltzer,” Goetz replied. “Politically, I mean. The arts commission people just don’t want us stirring up any trouble. Especially now that it looks like Fitzwallington’s work may bring some serious attention to Nashville art. You know, New York attention. Big city stuff. And I don’t see why this mad hatter thing has any bearing on whether there was anything fishy about Fitzwallington’s death. The old guy just died, it appears to me.”
Seltzer leaned back in his chair but locked the steely glare of his dark eyes directly on Goetz’s face.
“A week, sir,” Seltzer said. “Give me a week.”
The phone on his desk rang and Goetz reached for it. “I’m expecting a call that I need to take,” he said. “I’ll think about this but hold off for now.”
Goetz answered the phone and motioned for Seltzer to leave.
“Dead cop,” Seltzer said as he was leaving. “We have a dead cop to explain. Dead cops don’t go quietly away.”
Although the apparent reason for an unusually large gathering at the AvantArt gallery on a warm Thursday evening was a widely advertised showing of the latest works by the Nashville artist, Parker Palmer, a large number of the attendees had no interest in Palmer’s work. They were present because of other interests in the gallery and its proprietor, Athena Golden. They were tracing the scent of the recently dead Bechman Fitzwallington.
Fortunately, Athena Golden had anticipated a larger than usual crowd for this event so that she had opened up the expandable area at the back of the gallery. She had spaced the Palmer paintings out so that the affair would feel appropriately busy but not congested. She had also hung the small Fitzwallington painting left with her for appraisal by Richelieu Jones in what she thought was an inconspicuous spot in a corner; she still wasn’t sure what to do with that painting. She hated to give it up, but it wasn’t hers, and now it wasn’t clear who owned it. She was hoping for a number of much more valuable companion pieces in the near future.
Ms. Golden was usually pretty good at staging these gallery affairs, anticipating the size and nature of the crowd and setting the thing up appropriately. However, given recent events, leaving the Fitzwallington painting on display, even inconspicuously so, on this evening was a terrible mistake. Much to her chagrin, that little painting became the main attraction, wreaking havoc with Golden’s carefully planned symmetry of the affair. Most of the crowd was jammed into an unwieldy clot in the corner of the gallery where the small painting hung, largely neglecting the sizeable collection of Palmer’s works. Parker Palmer was enraged and didn’t hesitate to let Athena Golden know that, pulling her aside at every opportunity to make his feelings crystal clear.
A thin man in a wheelchair and his striking blonde companion, avoiding the clump of Fitzwallington admirers in the corner, maneuvered casually about the gallery paying only token attention to Palmer’s array of colorful paintings. It was an unusual outing for them. He still resented the cumbersome logistics of loading his folding wheelchair into the modest space in the front boot of her Boxster, and so they ventured beyond walking distance from Printers Alley only once in a while. But he wanted to attend this event and she was fine with that.
Truth be told, neither of them found the paintings particularly interesting or attractive. Instead of paying much attention to the art, the paraplegic man engaged in an intense scrutiny of each of a number of the other guests. He wondered why each of them was there and how each might fit into the narrative slowly developing in his mind. He had spent some time on the web learning what he could about these people. They were interesting in a morbid sort of way. But not the kind of people that Shane would have invited to his celestial dinner party.
Bruce Therault: Newly arrived on the scene but with a traceable history. New Yorker. Co-owner of the NYC gallery that had handled Fitzwallington art. Unscrupulous (or to be generous, semi-scrupulous) dealer in several largely speculative areas. Maybe connections with criminal element, carefully camouflaged as legitimate. Not a man to be trusted. Killer? Probably the kind of work he paid other people to do. No doubt he didn’t personally involve himself in the wet work. What was he doing in Nashville at a showing of a local artist whose work had not found an audience in the big city? Had to be something to do with the Fitzwallington thing.
Mace Ricci: Ex-NYC cop trying too hard and unsuccessfully to obscure that historical fact (pressed shirt, blue suit, and the shoes, brown, but still cop shoes). Left the force under something of a cloud. Working for Therault and God knows who else. Like a lot of ex-cops with shady histories in law enforcement, probably capable of exploiting his knowledge of the practicalities of the law and the logistics of the street to get done most anything his financers wanted done if the price was right. Did he kill BF? No doubt would have, given the opportunity and a high enough price. But he was operating outside the territory he knew and didn’t look comfortable there. And why was Therault here when his operative had already had some time to settle in? Trust? One should never employ a crook one doesn’t trust. On a suspect scale of one to ten, Ricci at the moment might rate, generously, a five.
SalomeMe: Ah yes, the lovely and achingly opaque SalomeMe. In full regalia she sat, extensively inked bare legs crossed, on a strategically chosen love seat near the center of the room. That is, she sat there for brief periods interrupted by lo
nger smoking breaks taken outside. Clearly uninterested in the art and determined to make that fact as conspicuous as possible, she sat looking off into space at apparently nothing in particular. Both Mace Ricci and Athena Golden seemed to be paying special attention to her, looking for opportunities to bend her ear. SalomeMe didn’t appear to be impressed with either of them. Murderess? A most obvious possibility. Presumed sole heiress to the now excessively valuable trove of Fitzwallington paintings. A deliberately transparent and passionate hater of her father. Lots of opportunity. Maybe a trifle too obvious. Still…could be.
Fiona Hayes: Hard to read. She was loitering around the edge of the group crowded in front of the small Fitzwallington painting. She didn’t appear to be particularly interested in the painting but had just gravitated toward the place where most of the people in the room had collected. Her sculptor friend was not with her. Ms. Hayes was a petite woman, an obvious devotee of strenuous physical exercise; that was particularly obvious in the muscularity of her deeply tanned legs, most of which were visible below the hem of a very short and very snug black leather skirt. She appeared to converse amiably with SalomeMe and went out of her way to engage SalomeMe in conversation a couple of times. From the Internet, she appeared to be a moderately successful producer of uniquely designed and vividly colored large ceramic wall hangings that she called tile paintings. An evil man! Her description, repeated with vehemence, of the dead artist. Did that passion drive this petite young woman to violence? And what lay behind such intensity? There was more to learn of Fiona Hayes. Would have to keep the possibilities open for her.
Two people whom Shane didn’t recognize attracted his attention. One was a middle-aged paunchy balding man who seemed a little chummy with Parker Palmer. When Palmer wasn’t talking to the guy or complaining to Athena Golden about the lack of attention to his paintings, Shane asked him about the stranger. Palmer allowed that the guy was a distant relative of his whom he hadn’t seen in ages and had no idea why the guy had turned up at the showing. Palmer suspected that his relative’s motives were something less than noble.
“Shane Hadley,” the other stranger approached Shane and called his name. Shane was quite sure that he had never met the man. “Damian Saturn. So you’ve taken a sudden interest in the arts?”
The man was medium height, ruddy complexion, neither fat nor thin, physically unremarkable. A generally nondescript persona except for his probably fictional name. Blue business suit. Red tie. Red pocket square. Brown shoes, cap toe, not wingtip. More Mens Wearhouse than anything recognizably designer. A man trying too hard not to attract attention. Must be a fictional name. There surely was no one on the planet actually named Damian Saturn. If it was not a parental felony to burden a child with such a moniker, it should be.
“Do I know you?” Shane replied.
Their eyes met, but neither man smiled.
“Not yet,” Damian Saturn replied. “Not yet.”
“Can you give me a valid reason why that situation should change?”
Shane was more than a little annoyed by how presumptuous this guy seemed.
“Oh,” Saturn responded, still not smiling and keeping eye contact, “there are some excellent reasons for us to know each other a bit better. They will become obvious when the time is right. You see, we share an interest in the art of Bechman Fitzwallington, although the nature of our interests is quite different. We will need to discuss those differences before long. I will be in touch.”
With no further word or gesture, Damian Saturn turned and left the gallery.
“What was that about?” Katya asked.
“Hell if I know,” Shane said.
Hardy Seltzer sat at his regular spot at the north end of the bar at TAPS (née The Dew Drop Inn), sipping his second beer and waiting for some attention from the bartender, his friend Marge Bland. He was recalling the conversation he had with his boss and trying to decide what to do. The conversation with Assistant Chief Carl Goetz had disturbed Hardy. His boss, and presumably others up the chain of command, had obviously caved in to the pols. Hands off the Fitzwallington situation was the message. Hardy thought that his superiors were way too unconcerned about a dead cop. And, Hardy didn’t buy the argument that the two situations—the Mad Hatter thing and Fitzwallington’s death—weren’t related. Maybe not, but there needed to be more investigation before he’d buy that. There had to be a lot more investigation. And, by damn, Seltzer would do whatever he could to see to it that this thing was explored a hell of a lot more than had been done so far.
“Hi, handsome,” Marge Bland had served the other bar customers and now focused her attention on the detective.
Lost in his thoughts and his beer, Hardy hadn’t noticed what she was doing for a few minutes and was startled by Marge’s sudden appearance in front of him and her greeting.
“Oh!” he said, jerking around to face Marge and sloshing some of his beer from the glass onto the bar. “You frightened me.”
“Frightened the brave detective? I must be a pretty scary woman,” she said. “What has you so preoccupied?”
“Death and politics,” Hardy answered, sipping disinterestedly at his beer.
“Heavy stuff,” Marge said. “Need to talk about it?”
“Need to think about it first,” Hardy replied. “Talk about it later.”
“Suit yourself,” Marge replied.
Marge Band was perfectly happy with Hardy Seltzer suiting himself. But she really didn’t have a choice.
As Hardy left the bar, cranked up the aging LTD, and headed down the steep First Avenue hill toward the river that marked the border between downtown and East Nashville, he retrieved his cell phone from his jacket pocket, scrolled to Shane Hadley’s number and punched it in.
When his cell phone chirped, Shane was sitting comfortably with his lovely wife on the deck of their Printers Alley flat, relishing a glass of wine and quietly reflecting on the better side of his life fortunes. Times like these made Shane feel fortunate in spite of (or because of) the wrinkles in his story. He reached for KiKi’s hand and she smiled.
The Alley was unusually quiet this evening, only a few people milling around. One particularly unremarkable man in a cheap suit stood in the doorway shadow of the blues bar across the way smoking a cigarette. He looked up toward where Shane and Katya sat but they didn’t notice him. At his phone’s insistence, Shane finally looked at the screen. Seeing that the caller was Hardy Seltzer, he answered the call.
Law enforcement is no less susceptible to the ambiguities of human behavior than politics, religion, or love. The imposed structure that is designed to assure consistency and clear lines of authority has to be there. And that structure needs to be conspicuous enough to convince the citizens it serves that responsible people are in control, that the law enforcement apparatus is operating effectively. That justice is being served. But there are human ambiguities.
Regardless of the dictates of the organizational structure, Hardy Seltzer was determined to see that the Fitzwallington case (he now thought that it was indeed a case just waiting to be defined that way) got the attention that the known facts and the dead cop deserved. And the only way to accomplish that without seriously risking his job security had to involve Shane Hadley. Hardy was OK with that, and when he proposed to Shane that he take the lead in the investigation with Hardy as a very silent partner, Shane agreed. After all, he was already doing the job and Hardy’s help, even under the table, should speed things along.
Sometimes justice, like water, seeks its own level, regardless of obstacles in its path. So, contrary to the wishes of the departmental hierarchy and the political and social establishment of the city, Detective Hardy Seltzer and paraplegic ex-detective Shane Hadley agreed to pursue an investigation which they were convinced justice demanded. But they would need to be careful. They would need to be very careful for some reasons they were yet to discover.
Chapter 18
Most of the murders that Shane Hadley had investigated as an ac
tive member of the Nashville Metropolitan Police Department were not that difficult to solve. The killer was usually fairly obvious—cuckolded husband, rejected boyfriend, drug deal gone south, bar brawl, etc. The culprit was easy to identify, and the task was to locate and arrest him (almost always a man). Of course, the evidence had to be gathered and the substance of a case that would prove guilt in court had to be developed carefully, but those were primarily technical matters. There wasn’t, as a rule, much mystery. Apart from the drama that was sometimes involved in actually apprehending the killer and bringing him in, murder investigations in Nashville were generally not very challenging.
And murderers in the city were not very clever, even when they tried to be. Efforts to disguise the cause of death or to divert suspicion from the perpetrator of the crime, point the cops in the wrong direction, were usually clumsy, not the work of professional killers with the skills and experience necessary to pull the thing off without getting caught. Most Nashville killers, even at their most creative, were rank amateurs. There were exceptions. It was his success at dealing with those exceptions that was the stuff of Shane’s reputation as an investigator, the enduring Sherlock Shane myth.
If he had an advantage over his colleagues in solving difficult cases, Shane thought it lay in simply paying attention. He would spend a long time alone at the crime scene before it was disturbed in any way, before the technicians descended to document things and collect samples.
Shane would just stand there focusing his five senses on the scene, registering what he saw, smelled, felt, and maybe on occasion heard or tasted. Not rarely, he would discover something that others overlooked by just paying attention. But that was only part of it. There were the sensed facts, but there was also something he couldn’t readily describe, a gestalt, a general sense of the situation. What his younger colleagues might call a vibe. The vibe revealed to Shane whether something malicious had happened there, and more often than not, the vibe was right. Shane had come to rely on this feeling, but recognized that it sounded spooky and so did not discuss it with anyone else.