“Bradley was very grateful for your help in getting rid of Pierce,” Clapper explained. He was referring to Pierce Lancaster, a junkie mob-connected professor who preyed on female undergraduates. “He is particularly happy that you kept the school’s name out of the media.”
I’d had my own reasons for sinking Lancaster. He almost got me killed and was a threat to Alice Watts. But I gladly accepted the membership.
“Don’t get a swelled head,” DeRenzi said when I told him about my membership. “Bradley probably figures you’ll get yourself killed soon enough.”
The membership came with a locker and after I changed I spent a grueling hour pounding a heavy bag with the gloves that Dom kept for me in his office. He wasn’t in the gym. Summer at Wagner is slow and he kept himself busy working at various camps run by other schools or organizations. I shouldn’t have had that last scotch. The heavy bag won. I hydrated and cooled down and then went to the weight room. My arms still felt like rubber but I managed to do three sets of 12 on every machine in the place. By the last set I was alternating seeing stars and black dots. I had my arms wrapped around the water cooler when Dom walked in.
“That stuff will kill you,” he said. “Come to my office. I got some healthy Coor’s Light in the fridge.”
CHAPTER 17 – STILL IN HER CORNER
The next morning, I woke to the persistent chiming of my cell phone. I sometimes use it for an alarm but didn’t remember setting it the night before. I shook my head to clear the cobwebs and realized it wasn’t the alarm. It was a call. Alice. I wondered why she was calling so early. Then I saw the time. It was after 9 A.M. Dead body, police interrogation, drinking, gym, more drinking. That would do it. For all that, I didn’t feel that bad. Sleep is never overrated.
“I heard about Elizabeth Olsen,” she said. “It was on the late news last night. The poor woman. You must feel terrible. They said a private investigator working for the family found her. I knew it was you.”
“I don’t like clients dying on me.”
“There’s more to it than that, Alton. You liked her, didn’t you? And you thought that perhaps she didn’t kill Denton. What are you going to do?”
I told her that Mac was going to get me the print and autopsy reports.
“If there’s anything there, I’m going to try to clear her.”
“Even if no one is paying you?”
“I’ve never been much of a businessman.”
“And the dead can’t clear their names on their own.”
“There’s that.”
My phone beeped.
“Alice, I have another call. It’s the Olsen’s attorney. I’d better take it.”
“Of course. Just remember, I’m here if you want to talk.”
“Just talk?”
She laughed.
“Wash your mind out with soap.”
***
An hour later Long and I pulled up in front of Olsen’s house. Konrad had asked for me. The butler let us in, looking sadder than ever. I didn’t blame him.
“Mr. Olsen is waiting for you in the library, Mr. Long.”
“How is he doing, Robert?”
I expected an “as good as can be expected.” Instead the butler surprised me. “He loved that girl,” he said. “It’s a terrible blow. This family has no goddamn luck.”
As we walked back to the library we had to pass the landing from which Elizabeth had dangled. I was glad Konrad had been spared that sight. I’m not sure I could have walked every day past the spot where my daughter had hung herself. There was no sign of the death and I could smell polish and floor wax. I suspected that every time Konrad smelled those odors, meant to eliminate memories, they would have the opposite effect. He rose when we entered the room, looking 10 years older.
“Thank you for coming, Mr. Rhode.”
“I’m very sorry for your loss, sir. I liked Elizabeth. Very much.”
“I understand you found her.” He lost his composure for a moment and his voice cracked. “They said she didn’t suffer. Was that your impression?”
“It was probably instantaneous,” I said carefully. “Her face was very peaceful.”
The three of us sat quietly for a moment, then Olsen said, “I presume you were ignoring my request that either Long or I be present when you spoke to her.”
It wasn’t an accusation. His daughter was dead. He just wanted to know.
“Something had come up. It was delicate. I’m not sure she would have spoken of it in front of you. And I’m not sure it will amount to a hill of beans.”
Konrad sat down heavily and waved us to our own seats.
“You did the right thing, of course. But tell me now what it was.”
I looked at Long.
“Konrad,” he said. “It’s all very speculative. The longest of long shots.”
“Steve! My daughter is in the morgue, being cut up. Her name has been dragged through the mud. Her alleged suicide closes the books for everyone.” I caught the ‘alleged’ but didn’t say anything. “In two days I’ll be burying my child, who they all think is a murderess. What can you tell me that could make me feel worse than I already do?”
So I told him. When I finished, he smiled and said, “Well, that wasn’t so bad, was it?”
Parents are truly the only ones who are always in your corner.
“Mr. Rhode, I want you to pursue that lead and anything else you can think of. Elizabeth did not kill herself. She was murdered, probably by the same person who killed Denton. I don’t care what it costs, or how long it takes. Find out who did this!”
“Konrad, have you thought this through?” Long said, obviously shocked. “An open-ended investigation could cost you a fortune. And might not produce the result you want.” He looked at me. “I’m sorry to butt in, Alton, but as Elizabeth’s attorney, it’s my duty.”
“You were my daughter’s lawyer, Steve. Not mine. I want Rhode.”
“I’m speaking as your friend now. And I know Rhode. He’d want me to say something.”
“Steve’s right, Mr. Olsen. Much as I like to hear the words ‘I don’t care how much it costs,’ you should listen to him. If the prints don’t pan out, and the odds are very much against us, there’s no place to go.”
“Elizabeth would never kill herself. I know my daughter. There is something to find out and you’re the one to do it. I’m not worried about you cheating me.”
“But who would kill her? The real murderer? It makes no sense. If Elizabeth was convicted, the killer would be home free. And even if we went to trial and raised enough doubts to win an acquittal, the police would not follow up. They, and everyone else, would say she got off on a technicality, or because she had money to hire a good lawyer.” He started to protest and I held up my hand. “I’m not saying Elizabeth was guilty. But that’s just the way it is. The real killer would still be safe.”
“Alton is making sense, Konrad. Listen to him.”
“What about my daughter’s good name? Just because she slept around doesn’t make her a murderess. Don’t you two care about that? Elizabeth was a wonderful person. I loved her.”
His voice broke again.
“Mr. Olsen,” I said, “I told you I liked Elizabeth and I meant it. I was going to stay on the job until I proved or disproved anything the prints showed, if there are any. On my own time. If it makes you feel better, you can pay me until then. I should know soon enough. But if I draw a blank, then that’s it. I won’t continue to take your money. Deal?”
“Deal,” he said, and we shook on it.
Outside, by our cars, Long said, “Poor bastard. Such a waste. Even had we lost she’d have been out in a few years. Still young. Now she’s dead, and Konrad might as well be.”
I drove to my office, called Mac and told him about my conversation with Olsen.
“You know, I remember when you couldn’t buy a client. Now they even die on you and you can keep billing. You should be a lawyer.”
“He’ll probably only
be a client until those prints come back. Have you heard anything?”
“Nah. Weekend coming up. They don’t think there’s any urgency now. In fact, I had to call in a lot of favors just to keep us in the game. Sullivan’s office doesn’t give a crap anymore. Hell, I can let them take their sweet time and it’ll be a month before we hear. I can even gum up the works. You’ll make a fortune. Just say the word.”
“Come on, Mac.”
“Just bustin’ your balls, kid. I’ll light a fire under their asses this afternoon, but don’t expect anything until next week. Take a break. Put it out of your mind. Elizabeth Olsen ain’t going anywhere.”
As I hung up I heard the door to my outer office open. I walked out just as Abby Jones was settling into her desk. I’d forgotten it was one of her days to moonlight with me.
“Are you early or late?” I teased her.
“I make my own hours, so I’m always on time. When you get successful enough to hire me full time I’ll put one of those clock things on the wall. Not likely, though, with your clients dying on you. I heard about it. Bad business. Poor gal, even if she was guilty. Bet the guy she plugged was no great shakes.”
I wasn’t surprised that Abby was sympathetic to Elizabeth. Abby had a hardscrabble life that included an abusive husband.
“Hell, no. Then you’ll hit me for overtime. I’ll make you management.”
“That’ll be the day.”
Abby didn’t blink an eye when I recounted my earlier conversations with Elizabeth Olsen and how Konrad Olsen wanted to keep me on the case.
“Man, the rich are different. Let me get my pad.”
Abby, as I had learned to my surprise, was a whiz with shorthand.
“You may get lucky with the chair,” she said after taking copious notes, which she would later transcribe into a succinct computer file of the case. “I was attached to a C.I.D. unit for a while in Iraq and we once got prints and DNA from a piece of a mortar shell after it exploded. Guy had rigged it with a cell phone to explode under a hard-ass officer’s cot. The base was always getting hit by insurgents and he waited until the bad guys tossed in a couple of rounds and then dialed a number and blew the shit bird up. He figured it would be the perfect fragging. Only problem was the base was trying out a new anti-mortar radar that identified where the shells were coming from. Nothing came down within a mile of the tent where the dead guy was. The C.I.D. guys are pretty sharp. Figured it out. The killer’s prints were on a piece of shrapnel.”
Later that afternoon I called Alice.
“Do you like horse racing?”
“I mist up and sing along when they play ‘My Old Kentucky Home’ at the Derby.’ But I’ve never been to an actual race.”
“There is a lovely little track down the Jersey Shore. Monmouth Park. I thought maybe we could go tomorrow. Head down to Spring Lake after and stay overnight at a bed-and-breakfast.”
She gave the husky laugh that I now found so alluring.
“I suspect there won’t be a lot of talking involved.”
“I may occasionally whinny like a stallion.”
“Only if you do it at the track.”
CHAPTER 18 – TRIFECTA
“These crab cakes are scrumptious.”
“Best I’ve had outside of Maryland,” I said, pouring us each some more champagne from a silver bucket next to our table. “We’re near the ocean. Everything here is fresh.”
We had spent the first hour at Monmouth watching the thoroughbreds up close as they walked from the paddock to the track. It was warm but not uncomfortably so and the sights, smells and sounds of the huge animals were invigorating. A woman jockey exchanged a smile and a small wave with Alice as she passed us.
“They are certainly beautiful,” Alice murmured at one point.
Now we were sitting in the air-conditioned clubhouse overlooking the finish line, which none of the horses on which I had wagered in the first eight races had managed to cross ahead of the pack. At the rate I was going, our four crab cakes, while large and almost solidly crustacean, would wind up costing me a couple of hundred dollars each. Alice, on the other hand, had cashed at least one ticket per race using a system that involved, as far as I could tell, the name of a horse, the color of a jockey’s silks and any last-minute hints she picked up from watching a post parade. In the third race she chose one horse because it evacuated its bowels and, Alice said, was now “lighter” than the other nags.
Her success rate was helped by the fact that she bet $2 on every horse for win, place and show and collected something even if her nag finished a distant third. At other racetracks, where sophisticated bettors reign, betting “across the board” is usually a recipe for disaster. But Monmouth is a rural venue, more Southern in character, and has a reputation for attracting “little old ladies in tennis shoes” who make quirky bets. Sometimes the payouts for a third-place finish rivaled that of the winner. Alice, certainly not a little old lady – she was wearing a white sundress and looked like she belonged at Ascot – had turned her eight $6 bets into almost $140. I, on the other hand, was now a little more sanguine about accepting Konrad Olsen’s money.
“Explain to me again how those other bets work,” she said.
I went through all of them: daily doubles, exactas, quinellas, perfectas, trifectas, superfectas, Pick 3’s, Pick 6’s, boxes, wheels and keys.
“How can anyone keep them straight? And think of all those poor horses, trying to run in exact order.”
I was learning that Alice could be a great tease. I soldiered on.
“Before the advent of modern computers, no one could. The daily double was an exotic bet. Basically all these new bets are designed to help separate customers from their money.”
“They seem to be working in your case. Why are you using them?”
“Because I’m an idiot.”
Alice slipped a foot out of her shoe and moved it along my calf under the table.
“But you know how to pick women. And that’s all I care about.”
I whinnied. A couple at a nearby table looked at us. We ordered Key Lime pie. It came, yellow and slightly grainy. Which is the way it’s supposed to be. The green tint in most store-bought Key Lime pies is food color.
“Oh, good. It’s real Key Lime pie,” Alice said.
I really do know how to pick women.
And in the next race my luck improved. Alice’s horse, selected because its jockey shared the same last name with one of her swimmers, won handily. Fortunately, I had included it in an exacta box and cut my day’s losses in half. In fact, just to be polite, I included Alice’s picks in all the remaining races and while none of them won, their third-place finishes bailed out some of my more scientific wagers and I left the track almost even. Alice was up more than $200.
“That was easy,” she said happily.
A half hour later we pulled into the parking lot of the Evergreen Inn, a Victorian bed-and-breakfast in Spring Lake. I parked in a spot next to a rack that had several bicycles with picnic baskets attached to the handlebars or behind their seats. None of the bikes was locked to the rack. A small sign said, “For Use of Guests.”
“This must be a trusting community,” Alice said.
“No self-respecting thief would be caught dead on a bike with a picnic basket. They’re free, by the way. And the B&B will pack a lunch for you. Also on the house.”
“You’ve been here before, obviously. Although somehow I can’t picture you riding a bike with a picnic lunch.”
“Those baskets are perfect for a six-pack. But, no, I’ve never used one. I just like this place. It has history. Dates from the 1880’s. At one time it was a brothel.”
“I bet they didn’t give anything away for free then.”
It was light out, and balmy, so after unpacking we drove to the beach for a swim. But it was still June and the water wasn’t balmy.
“Bracing,” I chattered as we treaded water after swimming out past the breakers.
“It’s effin
’ freezing,” Alice corrected me. “Let’s keep moving.”
I’m a strong swimmer, but I could tell Alice was holding back so as not to humiliate me. She was, after all, a swim coach who once had Olympic aspirations. But after a half mile up and back, we weren’t cold. Later, sitting on the sand, we watched the sun go down as the surfcasters came out.
“You’re an excellent swimmer,” she said.
“Said the dolphin to the sponge.”
“No, I mean it. And I could never go as long as you can under the water.”
“It’s called drowning.”
She laughed.
“No, you idiot. I remember how you swam the length of the Wagner pool underwater just to impress me the day we met, when I was with my team.”
“You noticed?”
“Of course, we all did.”
“Foiled, again.”
She leaned over and kissed me. I could taste the salt on her lips, and neck, and shoulders as I pressed her back on her towel.
“I think we might get arrested,” she said, finally, sitting up. “What time is our dinner reservation? And where?”
“Doolan’s Shore Club, at 9.”
“Then we’d better get back to clean up.”
“We have a little time.”
“Not if we’re going to fit in a quickie before we eat.”
Which we did.
The next morning we slept in, and almost missed the luxurious brunch the inn put out for guests. We both marveled at how we could be so hungry after the meal we’d had at Doolan’s. Of course, in the interim the night before there had been a couple of not-so-quickies. We had reached that point in our relationship where there were virtually no inhibitions, physically. At one point Alice even reminded me that we were in a bordello. The implication being that anything went. And did.
After checking out of the inn, we drove back using rural local roads and stopped at every farmer’s market and “antique” store Alice spotted.
“Some of the fruit you bought is older than these antiques,” I said in one faux shop.
LAURA LEE (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 2) Page 10