North of Montana ag-1

by April Smith

  But Galloway is not impressed with my beliefs.

  “They brought in the big gun from Washington, let him handle it.” He’s standing up again, arm around my shoulder as he walks me to the door. “You did a good job with what you had.”

  “Okay, you don’t like the morals clause—” I ball it up and toss it into the trash and flourish the printout under his nose. “How about this: new lead. Jayne Mason’s driver was busted for trading in stolen goods when he was a state cop.”

  Galloway raises his eyebrows. “Stop the presses.”

  “We know Mason is an abuser. I’m going to squeeze this guy and find out the real supplier, then I’m going to bust her for possession.”

  “Holy shit.”

  Galloway’s hand flies off my shoulder like it was a red hot frying pan.

  “Ana, we’re getting off the track.”

  “What if I can prove possession and trading in illegal substances on the part of Jayne Mason?”

  Exasperated, “That is not the direction anyone wants to go.”

  “I know, but—”

  Galloway stops me with a finger to his lips. He speaks softly and slowly, bouncing the finger to the rhythm of his words like a nursery rhyme: “Let us remember the suspect in this investigation is still Randall Eberhardt. Now listen carefully and tell me the answer: How will this help our prosecution of the suspect?”

  “Maybe it clears him,” I say.

  • • •

  It turns out that, despite whatever trouble “in the castle” between Tom Pauley and Maureen, during off-hours they have been living together in her rented apartment in Pacific Palisades, a comfortable suburban townlet just across the canyon from Santa Monica. Despite the mini-mailing of the main drag, it still feels like the fifties up here — families and ranch houses — which is why Maureen’s place is so unusual.

  The house is on a winding street, behind a large sliding gate. I walk down stone steps to the sound of trickling water; an artificial stream pools in a stone basin covered by water lilies and populated by real live burping frogs. Straight ahead is a small wooden deck overgrown with magenta bougainvillea, a white wrought-iron table, and chairs overlooking the misty curve of Will Rogers Beach, the bluish mountains, and the silver ocean all the way out to Point Dume. The vista is priceless.

  Although there are houses cheek to jowl along the street, in this glorious spot there is nothing but silence and wind through the flowers. It makes you hunger for Cheddar cheese and salty crackers and bourbon, watching the sunset on the deck. Turning back toward the house the view is equally charmed: gabled roofs, gingerbread trim, a Hansel and Gretel hideaway.

  The door, carved of soft wood with Balinese figures entwined in dance, is slightly open. I knock, get no response, and walk inside.

  “Hello? Tom? It’s Ana Grey.”

  Nothing.

  I pass a bedroom with rumpled sheets on a four-poster bed and clothes strewn over a worn Oriental rug. The air smells of sandalwood and sex. There is a dressing table loaded with antique perfume bottles, half of them knocked over and smashed. The closets are open and so are the drawers. Straw hats, dolls, and shawls are scattered everywhere as if picked up and tossed off their window seat. It looks like Tom and Maureen were robbed.

  I become more certain when I enter the ransacked kitchen. A pot is turning scorched and black, all the water boiled away, the burner still lit. I turn off the flame, crunching over a box of dried spaghetti spilled across the floor. Someone hurtled a bottle of apple juice against the wall. Someone else was throwing cans. I hear a soft moan coming from another room. The adrenaline goes up, weapon comes out.

  I move quietly down a hall that is decorated with ominous looking African masks to a living room with two windows of diamond-patterned glass opening to an ocean view. There are more masks, dolls with staring eyes and perfect china faces, secondhand sofas stuffed with pillows covered with chintz. A mobile of glass prisms in the window catches the sharp afternoon sun, spinning bars of colors over everything.

  And in the middle of the dizzying rainbows, planted stock-still on those bowed naked sunburned legs, is Tom Pauley, wearing nothing but a white T-shirt, slowly masturbating.

  He rolls his eyes toward me, red-rimmed. I catch the sheen of white stubble along an unshaven jaw.

  “Ana,” he mumbles mournfully, “help me out.”

  His thumb and forefinger move down the enlarged red-blue penis with a glistening drop of semen at the head. I reach over and grab a woolly afghan off a rocking chair and toss it to him.

  “Jesus, Tom, cover it up.”

  He holds the blanket in front of himself, sinks bare-assed onto the sofa, and starts to cry.

  “What went on here?”

  “We had a fight.”

  “Where is Maureen?”

  “Gone.”

  Tom is bent over double, holding his head in his hands.

  “Is she okay?”

  He nods.

  “You didn’t sock her black and blue, throw her over the cliff?”

  “I wouldn’t do that. I love her, Ana.” He lifts his face to me. The puffy features are melted together, streaming with self-pity. “God, I’m a fat old fart.”

  I holster the weapon and sit down to give him time to compose himself. The sofa is hard as a rock. It must be stuffed with horsehair or some other perverse material.

  “Interesting house.”

  “It was built in the sixties by a movie set designer.”

  He takes a big breath, draws his thumbs across his eyes.

  “Any connection to Jayne Mason?”

  “No, Maureen’s been living here for years, long before she met Jayne.”

  “How is Jayne? She must be busy, running from one talk show to another defending victims’ rights.”

  “I couldn’t care less about Jayne Mason right now.”

  “She cares a lot about you and Maureen. She was worried something like this might happen. She told me that night on our date.”

  “Jayne tries, but she could never understand my feelings for Maureen.”

  “Let’s talk about you. Want a glass of water?”

  He shakes his head.

  “Okay, let’s have a conversation about truck drivers who are allegedly robbed in remote areas of the California desert and a state cop who shows up on the scene and fakes a report so the goods can be fenced and resold, what do you think?”

  He wipes his nose with the bottom of his T-shirt. “In the past.”

  “Does Jayne know about your past?”

  “Jayne thinks I’m the greatest thing since chocolate syrup.”

  “Where does she get her drugs, Tom?”

  He stands up, holding the blanket around his waist.

  “No way, Ana.”

  “Jayne thinks you’re a chocolate ice cream soda, but Maureen thinks you’re a big pile of shit.”

  Getting upset again, “Leave me alone.”

  I stand also. “Not a problem. I’ll ask your young friend for her opinion, which at this moment is not very high. I can see why you like little girls but, no offense, Tom, what do they see in you?”

  A blush is growing beneath the white stubble.

  “After trying to kill you with a box of spaghetti, I’m sure she’ll be thrilled to tell me how you supply Dilaudid and Dexedrine and Valium and cocaine and all the rest of it to Jayne Mason.”

  “I have nothing to do with that.”

  “But you know who does.”

  His jaw tightens. His lips compress. The apartment suddenly seems very small, the doll faces fetishes, the Hansel and Gretel house a closed-in obsession.

  “It must have been fun while it lasted, you and Lolita with the fourteen-year-old tits.”

  “Go to hell.”

  “New plan: you get dressed and we cruise over to Westwood.”

  “What for?”

  “The Bureau has a keen interest in this case and I’m sure this hotshot specialist from Washington would like to talk to someone who ha
s intimate knowledge of what goes on in Jayne Mason’s house, maybe go over a little of your own past history.”

  The rainbows spin over us.

  “It’s not me.”

  “Okay.” I let out a big, benevolent sigh like I’m finally letting him off the hook. Gently, compassionately, “Why don’t you put on some clothes?”

  He picks up a pair of sweats from the couch, slips them on, and plops back down with a righteous look, rubbing the sweat from his temples.

  “We know it’s Dr. Eberhardt,” I say, as if confiding a professional secret. “We’ve already busted his ass.”

  Tom Pauley shakes his head, sneering. “That’s exactly the reason I hated the feds when I was a state cop. You guys are so fucking arrogant and so fucking wrong.”

  I can see he’s got a bone to pick, so I hand him a great big turkey thigh: “We believe that we have an airtight case against the doctor.”

  “He’s the one who wanted Jayne in Betty Ford, for Christ sake,” Tom blurts out. “Magda Stockman tried to keep her out.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “Yeah, well I was there.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Now he’s on the moral defensive, red-faced and indignant: “Jayne almost offed herself with downers, okay? The doc comes out to Malibu and sees this and suddenly he gets it: the lady is an addict. He goes to her manager, who’s obviously the one who runs her life, and says, We’ve got to help this lady get off drugs or she’s going to die.’ Magda says, ‘I’ll do everything I can to help.’

  “Jayne throws up for two days, she’s sick as a dog, they send me out at eleven o’clock at night to get some kind of goddamn tea. I have to drive all the way to Culver City to find an all-night health food store, and when I get back I hear them going at it in the den.”

  “Fighting?”

  “Jayne’s into that helpless little-girl thing, whining that she has to go to Betty Ford like the doctor says. Magda tells her”—imitating the throaty accent—“ ‘He only wants your money, Jay. Nobody loves you as much as I do.’ ”

  “Magda was trying to save the contract with the cosmetics company.”

  “Magda was trying to control Jayne, period. She heard from Maureen that Jayne was getting close to this doctor and it freaked her out. Who do you think convinced Jayne to cut the guy off at the knees?”

  “All roads lead to Magda.”

  “While Jayne was seeing the doctor, she tried to go straight but she was a mess — crying jags, migraines, panic attacks. Finally she went back to Maureen. Maureen didn’t want the responsibility so — you’re right — she took it to Magda.”

  Finally the dynamic of that overwrought household becomes clear, but I want it from Pauley.

  “Maureen didn’t want responsibility for what? Sorry if I’m being dense.”

  “For getting Jayne high,” he exclaims with frustration.

  There is silence. Rainbows turn slowly in the dust-laden air. Realizing what he has said, Pauley’s face crumples but stops short of tears.

  “Maureen is Jayne Mason’s street connection,” I supply softly. “That’s why she’s kept around as a ‘wardrobe girl.’ ”

  “She’s a cokehead,” Pauley says in a deep, choked voice. “As if you couldn’t tell. Magda had her on a golden string.”

  “Paid for her habit?”

  “You’ll never get Magda. That’s the beauty of it.”

  I desperately wish I were wearing a wire.

  “Unless you turn witness. Against Magda and Maureen.”

  He doesn’t answer. The face is hardening now, the eyes two cold ovals of red.

  “Let’s say in exchange for immunity from prosecution for any part you might have played in the sale or consumption of narcotics.”

  “Jesus, Ana, that is total crap.”

  ‘We need your testimony.”

  He thinks it over. After a moment, he slowly assents by nodding his head.

  Just to make sure, “If you love her, why give her up?”

  He seems different now, set, a grown-up man who realizes this is the last moment he may have to regain any control over the rest of his life.

  “When you came out to the house,” he asks, “did you ever meet Jan, the brainless beach bum?”

  The windsurfing instructor with the righteous calves who was watching them that day on the beach through a pair of binoculars.

  “I remember Jan.”

  “Maureen was fucking him the whole time.”

  Tom Pauley sweeps a pair of undershorts up off the floor in an angry arc and stalks toward the bedroom.

  • • •

  Maureen huddles in the interrogation room bawling like a baby.

  “I can help you,” Galloway is saying softly. “We can get you through this terrible situation, or do you want to wait until your lawyer gets here?” he adds, because the tape is running.

  “This is going to kill my dad.”

  Galloway hands her a tissue. I let him go for it. My job is to sit there with my legs crossed, projecting female sympathy.

  “The best thing you can do for your dad is take care of yourself, Maureen. You haven’t been doing a very good job of that, have you?”

  Maureen shakes her head. She’s so clogged up with tears she can hardly breathe. The wan cheeks are raspberry red.

  “Tell us where you bought the pills.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Are you afraid of the dealers?”

  She nods, pushing at the wet hair across her eyes.

  “You have good reason. They’re bad people. But see”—here Galloway sighs like the problem is really his—“if you don’t give them up, you’ll go to jail and they’ll be out on the street doing business as usual. Is that fair?”

  “It’s my own fault.”

  I nod encouragingly.

  “That’s true and eventually you’ll have to deal with that. But right now you can help yourself if you assist our agents in nailing these bastards.”

  She’s silent.

  “They took advantage of you. And Jayne.”

  Shredding the tissue into snow.

  “She said she’d take care of me,” Maureen whispers with her eyes down, “if anything ever happened.”

  Galloway opens his arms and looks around the room. His eyes pop wide. “So where is she? You tried. You used your one phone call to get through to Jayne Mason so she could trot over here — where is she?”

  “Her secretary said she’s in France,” Maureen answers in a high voice, “because she’s got this new makeup coming out.”

  “And if she was around the corner? Maureen. Look at me.” Galloway touches her gently under the chin. “If she was around the corner, honey, would she walk into this office and admit that she’s a drug addict and she used you like a slave to get what she needs? Or do you think she’d deny it and employ her influence to stay out of Maureen’s little mess? You know Jayne Mason better than anyone. Tell me. Will she protect you like you’re protecting her?”

  You can almost hear the small bones breaking. Maureen takes three or four choppy breaths. The rage is spent, the grief begins. She weeps quietly into two open hands realizing how profoundly she’s been betrayed.

  When I leave the room, I run smack into Donnato.

  “We got Mason’s supplier. It’s the wardrobe girl.”

  “Congratulations.”

  “Look.”

  Special Agent Jim Kelly is striding toward the interrogation room. Jim is supervisor of the Drug Squad.

  “She’s going to give up her street connections.”

  “This could turn into a nice little narcotics bust,” Donnato murmurs wonderingly.

  “That’s because I’m terrific.” I punch Donnato in the arm and laugh. “And now Galloway’s got something for the Director.”

  “Not what they expected.”

  “Better than they expected. I have to hand it to Galloway, he’s willing to go after Jayne Mason on possession. It’s a political hotcake, but talk abou
t publicity for the Bureau.”

  “You’ll close the bar at Bora-Bora tonight.”

  ‘Want to partner up?”

  Donnato smiles at me for the first time in weeks. “I’ve got dinner, homework, and a science project on electromagnets.”

  Rosalind comes up to where we are talking. She’s wearing that peculiar look again.

  “Santa Monica P.D. on the phone for Ana. You weren’t at your desk. I figured I’d best come after you.”

  I speak to an earnest young officer named Brandt who tells me Dr. Randall Eberhardt is dead. Since the deceased has been under investigation by the FBI, he thought I might be interested in coming down to Twentieth Street to have a look, as a courtesy, in the interest of promoting interagency cooperation.

  TWENTY-TWO

  THE MEW CONTEMPORARY two-story Mediterranean in the exclusive neighborhood north of Montana, five bedrooms, five and a half baths, gourmet kitchen, et cetera, is now skirted by yellow tape marking it as a crime scene.

  Three Santa Monica police cruisers and an ambulance are parked at the curb. There isn’t a big crowd — maybe twenty-five neighbors, joggers, housekeepers with babies in strollers — because it is only 2:35 in the afternoon on a Wednesday.

  I recognize a Metro reporter from the Los Angeles Times and there’s a kid from The Outlook, a streamlined edition of the same Santa Monica Evening Outlook that ran a photograph of my grandfather and a stolen wheelchair almost thirty years ago. The two crime reporters are scouts for the media, like a pair of ants roaming your countertop; next time you look, it will be swarming.

  I badge the cop at the door and walk inside. From the number of people and their intensity, I know something bad is waiting at the top of the stairs. A Santa Monica police detective is on the phone yelling about the delay in picking up the body. I heard on the radio driving over that there was a four-car collision with fatalities on the 405, so the coroner’s office is probably all backed up.

  I walk up the steps, past a ficus tree, toward the crystal chandelier so out of reach. I am stopped again by a cop.