The Cooperman Variations

by Howard Engel

  “What do you do in television?” he asked, licking the length of a finger.

  “Nothing,” I said. “What about you?”

  “I write detective stories. I’m Sheldon Zatz.”

  “I’ve always admired the authenticity of your police work,” I said. “You must do a lot of research.”

  “I’m tireless when it comes to the details,” he said, taking the last piece of smoked salmon in the room.

  Philip Rankin swam towards me through the smiles and metallic chatter, already well supplied with a fistful of salmon. With his fish-like features, he and the salmon looked like an illustration of the food chain. “Ah, dear boy, still with us, I see. Ken hasn’t mewed you up in one of his oubliettes?”

  “Sorry, I don’t recognize the word.”

  “Dungeon. It’s rumoured that he has places where he hides things and people.”

  “He’s just offered to buy me a beer. Shouldn’t I trust him?”

  “Far be it from me to inform on a colleague, but you might ask him about the files on a certain Tory backbencher. They just disappeared. Quite amazing.”

  “But just the files?”

  “Yes. Of course. As far as we know. I think news people are still essentially children, don’t you? They take no responsibility.”

  “I haven’t given it much thought,” I said as another thought crossed my mind. “Mr. Rankin, while I have you on the phone, so to speak, may I ask you one last question?”

  “Granted. You see what hard liquor does to me in the early afternoon? What is it, dear boy?”

  “Dermot called Renata—I’m almost sure it was Renata—bowmaker, his little bowmaker. Did you ever hear him say that?”

  “Oh, goodness me, yes. It was his nickname for her.”

  “Could you explain it?”

  “Mr. Cooperman, I wouldn’t expect you to know this—hardly anyone does—but Renata bore the last name of one of the very great bowmakers in Italy. Just as great cellos are remembered by the men who made them, so are fine bows. Sartori was one of the finest bowmakers the world has ever seen. Dermot used the word enchantingly to, and of, Renata. It made her blush in company. That’s why he did it, of course. He had the devil’s own mischief about him. Any more questions?”

  “No, but thanks for the answer to that one. I’m sorry, I don’t know whether it’s important or not. Maybe I’ll know later on.”

  “You seem to have developed an insatiable appetite for information about my friend Dermot Keogh. Any special reason?” I’m not sure, but Rankin’s brow looked moist from this angle. Was he beginning to feel the pressure?

  “No. It’s just that I’ve been told that you’re the authority. Being in charge of all of his unreleased recordings is a grave responsibility.”

  “Ha! How I wish I could hear those words from my boss, Ted Thornhill! You’re a man of fine sensibilities, Mr. Cooperman. I wonder, would you like to see where Dermot’s tapes are prepared and mastered before their release to the public?”

  “You mean at Sony’s studios in New York?”

  “Oh no, no, no. Much closer than that. In fact not very far from where we’re standing. Dermot’s studio is at 18 Clarence Square, just below King Street at Spadina.”

  “I heard that he had a glory hole somewhere in the city.”

  “Glory hole indeed! Yes, I spent many spellbinding hours with him as he worked with his editor, looking for just the right take on a particular piece of music. Dermot never thought in terms of union rates. He scarcely knew what ‘overtime’ or ‘time and a half’ meant. But it was all worth it. If you’d ever care to have a guided tour of the studio, I’d be glad to show you around.”

  “That would be a treat.”

  “As a matter of fact, I have to go over there later this afternoon, say around 4:30. If you happen to be in the neighbourhood, just bang on the door. I’ll hear you. Now that I think of it, there’s something most particular I’d like to discuss with you in the privacy of that place. Nobody can talk at cocktail parties, can they?”

  “I might be free about then. I’ll bang on the door, as you say.”

  “Excellent! I must confess that I never tire of giving a tour of Dermot’s inner sanctum. It’s a hobby horse of mine, I fear. Shall we say around 4:30, then?”

  The press reception had been going on for a good hour. The place was beginning to look like the lettuce on the edge of most of the trays on the buffet: a little wilted. I began scouting to see whether Vanessa was getting ready to leave. She wasn’t. Not quite, anyway. She was standing forehead to forehead with Ted Thornhill and arguing the future of Entertainment, with an increased budget, I’m sure. Hy Newman was passing behind her when she grabbed him by the arm and brought him into the charmed circle. Thornhill turned quite red in the face when he saw him. Vanessa clapped him on the back and everybody shook hands as if they’d never held a dagger in them.

  “Ben!” It was Devlin. I turned and wondered what was on his mind so soon after our recent conversation. “Ben, a few of us are going over to ROYC tomorrow for a sail at six. That’s my yacht club over on the Island, you know? We’ll just take a run around the Island, nothing fancy. If you’d like to come, I’ve got all the gear you’ll need stowed on board. It’s just a thought. Chance to get to know you better.”

  “How soon do you need to know? I’ve got some things to do tomorrow, but I should be clear by six.”

  “Great! If you can swing it, we’ll be catching the six o’clock ROYC ferry at the foot of Spadina. I want you to meet some of my friends. They’re as crazy about boats as I am.”

  I nodded assent. I thought it might prove an interesting trip. Besides, I’d never been to a proper Upper Canadian yacht club before. I thought it might be instructive to put myself among people who had the right clothes for every situation.

  Ten minutes later one of the limos hired for the occasion dropped us in front of the network building on University Avenue. George Brenner was standing in front with his hair trimmed and wearing a shirt and tie. It was a new George, or at least a new side of him. He and Vanessa exchanged looks that I wasn’t supposed to see. He even spared me a grin as Vanessa preceded me through the revolving doors.

  I could tell from Sally’s face that there was a reception committee just inside the closed doors of Vanessa’s office. Vanessa caught the look on Sally’s face too and coolly asked her to hold all her calls until further notice.

  Inside her large office, the three cops I had been talking to were sitting together on a couch. Rub-a-dub-dub. On our entry, they shot to attention, looking like schoolboys caught smoking behind the gym.

  Sykes was the first to speak: “Ms. Moss, I told you that we might have to have another talk with you. Well, the time has come.” He thanked her for her frank and open co-operation so far and hoped that in this same spirit of helpfulness they would be able to continue their inquiries. Then he introduced Detective Sergeant C.R. Pepper. Vanessa made for the door to beg coffee of Sally. Boyd had half risen as she moved, then tried to regain his seating surreptitiously when she returned to sit down in front of her desk.

  “I want to get to the bottom of Renata’s death as much as you do, Sergeant Sykes. Tell me what you want, and I’ll do my best to respond. But, just for the record, am I under arrest?”

  “No! Certainly not. We just have a few questions.”

  “I see. Then, fire away. Oh, do you mind if Mr. Cooperman stays? He’s as close to an attorney as I have handy. Besides, as you know, he has been giving this case a good deal of attention. He might help us all.”

  “Yes, we know all about Benny. And I have no objection to his staying. What about you, Chuck?”

  Pepper shrugged. “No objection from me. I reckon Benny’s been more of a help than a hindrance since he got here.” With that settled, we stalled around until the coffee arrived. Sally caught my eye, and I tried to reassure her with a look that we weren’t all about to be taken downtown in handcuffs.

  “Well, then, let’s get started.
We don’t want to waste any more of your time than necessary. First of all, Ms. Moss, why was Renata Sartori staying in your house on the night of the murder?”

  “You may remember that I told you that. It’s in my statement, the one I made when I came back to town from Muskoka.”

  “I have a copy here. You said that she had been using your house while you were up north. She had an apartment of her own, I believe?” said Sykes.

  “Please don’t patronize me, Sergeant! You know she had an apartment; you’ve probably searched every inch of it. I know the address too. I’ve been there twice. The first time, when my husband and I began having difficulties, Renata offered me her spare room. The second time I stayed with her was when my house was being decorated. When Renata’s apartment was being redone, she came to my place. I was simply returning the favour. Oh, I should say that she’d stayed with me once before. It was just after Dermot Keogh drowned. She was in bad shape and somebody had to take her in. She was with me over a week, until we started getting on each other’s nerves. A good sign that she was on the mend.”

  “It was just redecorating? She wasn’t having trouble with the current boyfriend?”

  “She may have been. And I’ve heard that story. Perhaps both are true. I know we never had time to discuss it. I was off to Muskoka when she arrived. I had a bag full of pilot scripts, and I had to get out of Toronto.”

  “Did you visit anyone while you were up north?”

  “I saw the man at the marina where I keep my boat. Is that what you mean? I didn’t have any appointments. I was alone the whole time, except when I was foraging for food, visiting the bookstore in Port Carling or stopping in Bracebridge just to look around. I took my canoe out at least once a day.”

  “So you didn’t see anyone connected to NTC?”

  “Isn’t that what I just said?”

  “I’m only trying to get things clear.”

  “May I ask a question?” I said to Sykes. He nodded sharply. I guessed it allowed me one short question. “Besides yourself and Evans at the marina, who else has keys to Ed Patel’s cottage?”

  “Who?” Boyd glanced at Sykes, as though he’d slept through act two of a three-act play.

  “Local lawyer, not far from the marina.”

  “I don’t know of any other keys. Maybe Alma. Alma had keys to everything.”

  “Benny, what’s going on here? We’ve never heard of either of these people.”

  “Patel’s in the Bracebridge hospital, dying, I think. Alma Orchard was his secretary until she died about four weeks ago in an accident.”

  “Accident?”

  “She took a radio into the bathtub with her.”

  “That’ll do it all right. How is she mixed up in all this?”

  “She had been watching over Ed Patel’s affairs since he went into hospital.”

  “And? Come on, Benny, don’t ration it!”

  “There’s not much more to tell. Patel knows Vanessa, and knew both Renata and Dermot Keogh. He also knows those NTC executives who have places on Lake Muskoka. There are more of them than you might expect, because a bunch of properties came up for sale or rental a few years ago. Called the Bradings Trust. People like Philip Rankin and Ken Trebitsch. Now don’t go asking me whether that’s important or not. I don’t know.”

  Jack Sykes looked at me a full ten seconds and then moved his eyes to Vanessa. “Are you planning to leave the city during the next week, Ms. Moss?”

  “I have no plans to do anything but ride this desk. I’ve been away and there’s catching up to do.”

  “Good. Are you moving back into your house?”

  “No. I’ll stay where I am, and when I decide to go home, I’ll let you know.”

  “That’s the answer I was expecting.” Sykes got to his feet, and with a moment’s delay, Boyd and Pepper followed suit. “Thank you for your co-operation, Ms. Moss. I hope that we will get to the bottom of this quickly and that you’ll be able to return to your normal life without the fears of the last couple of weeks.”

  “Thank you for that wish. I hope you’re right.” The police officers and I left the office and headed for the elevator. Vanessa followed us as far as Sally’s desk, where she found that she had a stack of telephone messages to answer. I caught her miming a monosyllable under her breath as she winnowed them into two piles. I was about to return to my own desk, when Jack called out to me.

  “Benny, can I borrow you for ten minutes?”

  “I’m on the job, Jack. I’m trying to see to it that Ms. Moss is alive at the end of the day.”

  “Well, lock her in her office for fifteen minutes. I won’t keep you.”

  Vanessa, who had heard this, came to my aid. “Gentlemen, take him by all means, but please return him so that he may be blamed for any more attempts to marginalize me with malice aforethought.” She said it as a joke, but just touched with a bite of gallows humour. The cops made way for me and we disappeared into the elevator.

  “Benny, I—”

  “We don’t talk in elevators, Jack. Unless you want to send Commander Dunkery a greeting from 52 Division. His eyes and ears are everywhere.” Pepper looked at me, up at the ceiling of the car and then at Sykes and Boyd. He shrugged as we made our way down twenty floors to a still largely unbugged Mother Earth.

  TWENTY-THREE

  We were back in the Second Cup across from the police station on Dundas Street. We had coffee and biscotti in front of us and nobody was talking. The café was nearly full of people coming from or going to a show at the art gallery across the street. They looked bright and motivated, which was more than I was feeling. Jack, Jim and Chuck sat looking at me to see if I dared chew a biscotti under their gaze without talking first. I chanced it and they all pounced at once.

  “Benny, you’ve got to—”

  “Cooperman, we know what you’re up to—”

  “Damn it, Benny, what the hell are you messing about in?”

  I shrugged to show my complete ignorance of what they were talking about and picked up my coffee. “Wherever I go in this town, somebody’s always leaning on me. What’s the matter with you guys? I’ve just agreed to do three things that may get me killed and all you want is for me to spill my guts out.”

  “Who’s going to kill you? Outside this room, I mean?”

  “Ken Trebitsch, head of News at NTC, one swell suspect, has just invited me to have a friendly beer with him.

  Philip Rankin wants to show me around Dermot Keogh’s old studio down on Clarence Square. He says he has something ‘most particular’ he wants to discuss with me. And to top it off, Ray Devlin, the legal whiz, has just invited me for a sail aboard his yacht tomorrow.”

  “How are these invitations dangerous?” Boyd wanted to know.

  “All of these invitations are out of character; that makes them highly suspicious. Devlin doesn’t go sailing with sharpies from Grantham, not when they fail to make one hundred and sixty thousand a year. I’m not in his social group. Rankin has no reason to be nice to me. And Trebitsch even admits that the meeting is just another way to get from me what he’s wanted all along.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The sight of my tail lights heading for the nearest road out of here. He’ll settle for that. Maybe he’d like to see a little blood. I don’t know him well enough to guess.”

  “Where are you meeting him and when?”

  “In about fifteen minutes,” I said, with a glance at my watch. “At the James Joyce Irish Pub on Bloor Street.”

  “I’ll go along,” said Chuck Pepper. “Trebitsch doesn’t know me. And he knows you guys too well. Remember the trial involving Whatshername? That nurse? NTC News was all over that one.” Both Sykes and Boyd looked at one another. That case was not one of their scrapbook cases.

  “When are you meeting Devlin?”

  “The ROYC ferry dock at the foot of Spadina at six tomorrow night.”

  “He say there would be others coming?”

  “Yeah, but I won�
�t be surprised to find myself alone on his slow boat to China.”

  “I’d like to wire you before you talk to these guys. You ever worn a wire, Benny?”

  “There’s no time. I have to meet Trebitsch right now.”

  “Okay, Jim and I’ll head down to Clarence Square now and try to set something up. What’s the number?”

  “Eighteen.”

  “You won’t see us, Benny, but we’ll be there. Someplace.”

  “This is too much like the movies. The ones where the point man gets hit.”

  “It could be the breaking of this case. Rankin, Trebitsch or Devlin. You could take all of them, Benny. If there’s a fight, I mean. They’re in worse shape than you are.”

  “Good. At least I’m not meeting them together.” Our gang was adjourned after that, with Chuck heading out the door before the rest of us.

  I took a taxi to Bloor and Spadina and walked west. A young woman was interviewing a panhandler sitting on a milk crate in a doorway. He looked like he’d been interviewed before; his answers to her questions were well expressed. I tried to look through the clear sections of the frosted glass that covered the windows of the James Joyce Irish Pub. I walked in. To my right stood amps and microphone stands and stools on a rudimentary stage in a window alcove. It was a set-up for some music group who were nowhere in sight. Clearly visible in a seat at the far end of the bar sat Chuck Pepper, with his jacket removed and the sleeves of his shirt rolled up above the elbow. I’m not sure whether the tattoo visible on his left forearm was from the police academy or not. The blond head of a Guinness in front of him had everything under control. Chuck’s upper lip looked like a milk ad. I looked around for Trebitsch or one of his boys, but I couldn’t find them. I ordered a draft of Smithwicks, which sounded suitably Irish, and carried it to a table near a window. To pass the time, I started watching the people passing outside. I divided them into men and women, getting five men to every four women. Then I tried checking men with hats against men without them. Most men didn’t wear them. By the time I was checking skirts and dresses against pants and shorts, I saw Ken Trebitsch step out of a navy blue BMW driven by someone who drove off, while Trebitsch came into the gloom of the pub. He didn’t take long to find me. Then he didn’t waste words.