by Неизвестный
Ivanovich’s brow lowered into a scowl, he withdrew his bandaged hand from his pocket and flashed a smile devoid of sincerity. “My shirt needed a touch up, so I attempted to iron it myself with a fancy plug-in job that makes its own steam. I learned the hard way that it only takes a moment for them to heat up and scald.”
“Try a healthy dab of Vaseline on it,” said Alan. “It’s what the oil riggers in Texas use for burns and cuts.”
Ivanovich smiled indulgently, nodded, and resumed his conversation with the apartment manager.
* * *
Ben and Alan took the stairs down to the fourth floor but stopped at the landing on five. “So what are you thinking?” asked Alan. “Murder, arson, or accidental fire?”
“I’m still reserving judgment on this. There are some strange coincidences here, and you already know I don’t believe in that sort of thing. So we’re forced to treat it as an accident until we find clear, convincing evidence to the contrary. The guy’s got a ton of money in real estate, but I can’t see him starting a fire here, unless finances have been bad and he’s looking to take the easy way out and cash in on insurance or fake a bankruptcy. If anything, though, trapping a man in a box and burning him alive would require a lot of rage. So if this turns out to be murder, I’m thinking the motives here are extremely personal and passionate.”
“I’m with you on that.”
“But as I told you earlier, these magicians are a clever group. We’ll be hard pressed to show what really happened, unless we come up with a motive for murder or arson. Finding that would point us in the right direction.”
“You knew all along that he had a sword hidden inside that walking stick?” asked Alan.
Ben nodded. “I did, but I’m not sure how. Might’ve been the way he held it, like he’d been a cavalry officer making ready to draw across his body, charging into cannon fire. I saw a few hidden swords while on the circuit in Europe, mostly in France and Spain. I think the burnished lion head gave it away. Seemed too fancy for someone to want to put weight on.”
“Thanks for slowing me down. I might’ve walked right into a thrust. He seems to be the type who’d stick people first and apologize later—and then only if they were still able to stand and someone forced him.”
“Guys like Ivanovich take care of themselves first. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn he’s made his dough clawing and climbing over a pile of bodies.”
“Pantages might have been one of them,” said Alan. “He got his bones picked clean by his attorneys while trying to clear his name. He won a reversal of his conviction on appeal, but it cost him everything he had.”
“Fire sale prices,” said Ben. “And speaking of fires, good eye on the bandaged hand. How’d you know he’d burned it?”
“I didn’t know, I played a hunch.”
Ben nodded and creased a smile. “Hanging around Vera’s been good for you.”
“That it has,” said Alan. “That is has...”
9
Alan and Ben took the steps and worked their way down
the floors, checking the large collection of cans in the garbage rooms for the police tunic and helmet. While on the fourth floor, they decided to talk with the magician’s assistants in room 410.
“If we had a crime and we thought they were our suspects, we’d interview them individually,” said Ben. “But we’re not sure of any of that yet. So I say we go easy and see if they give up something useful.”
“Got it,” said Alan. He stood to the side of the door and knocked, as Ben had taught him on another occasion, another hotel. Standing away from the door had paid off for them in Chinatown when a shooter fired through the door after they’d knocked and announced who they were.
“Who’s it?” barked a male voice from inside the room.
“Police!” said Ben. “We need to speak with you.”
Inside the room, voices spoke in low tones in a dialect unfamiliar to Alan. He guessed Russian, and glanced at Ben. He nodded back, apparently in sync with Alan’s thought.
“Policia?”
“Da!” said Ben.
The door opened a few inches, and a dark haired man with bushy brows stuck his nose into the large crack. Ben held up his police shield and Alan did as well with his P.I. badge. “Police,” Ben repeated.
The man opened the door all the way. Another man of similar age and stature was seated, hunched over a small kitchen table with an overfull ashtray, an open bottle of vodka, and drinking classes with clear liquid. Both men gazed suspiciously at their new guests through the smoky haze.
“Were both of you in the theater tonight?” asked Ben.
The men glanced at each other, only their eyes moving. Finally, their heads nodded.
“We’re glad you made it out safely, but we’re wondering if you know if anyone is missing.”
More shifting of eyes. “Pavel’s not come back yet,” said the one who’d answered the door.
“What about the magician, Frederic St. Laurent?” asked Ben.
The man’s brow furrowed. “He stays on the ninth floor.”
Ben smiled evenly. “We know that, but have you seen him since the fire?”
The man interpreted for the other, who nodded his understanding and then shook his head. “We haven’t seen Frederic since the fire.”
“I see,” said Ben. “And what is Pavel’s last name?
“Medved.”
“How old is he?”
The man said something in Russian to the other man, and they quickly agreed on a number. “Forty-five.”
“Are you the two who dress as the eunuchs?” asked Alan.
The man stared at Alan’s eyes and mouth, puzzled.
“Eunuchs,” said Alan. “The men on stage with turbans and your arms crossed.” Alan crossed his arms in front of his chest dramatically, as an example.
Both men nodded. “Da.”
“What about Pavel?” asked Ben. “What does he do?”
The man lowered his head and rolled it back and forth. “We’re not supposed to tell the secrets,” he said.
“Does he dress as the devil?” asked Ben gently.
The two men exchanged glances and nodded sheepishly, like mischievous boys caught by a priest.
“How about dressing as the policeman?” asked Ben. “Does he wear the tunic and helmet?”
The spokesman shook his head. “He not wear that.”
“Does Frederic wear that?” asked Ben.
The man lowered his head and gazed at the other at the table. “We get in trouble if we say too much, please. You understand?”
“I think we have enough to go on,” said Ben. “Are you two close friends with Pavel?”
The talker rolled his head as he thought, while the other man looked away, glancing out the window. “He’s quiet all the time. Keeps to himself. Wakes up screaming some nights, then he goes out and walks around. He’s a lonely man.”
“He tell you what the dreams are about?” asked Alan.
The man translated to the one at the table, who seemed irritated at the intrusion. After a short exchange he nodded knowingly. “I hear him sometimes say, ‘Not the babushka! Not the babushka!’ That’s as close to English as I can make it for you.”
“Does he have family?” asked Ben.
“Is something the matter with Pavel?” asked the talker. “Have you found him?”
“We’re not sure,” said Ben. “There’s a body in the casket on stage. We might need you to identify it later.”
The talker spoke excitedly to the other man, whose eyes flashed wide before his shoulders slumped. “So the seer’s prediction has come true then? What about Frederic? Where’s he?”
“We don’t know yet,” said Ben. “Does he sometimes wear the devil’s outfit and on
e of you the magician’s robes?”
The men looked at each other and shook their heads. “We play many parts, but you ask too much from us.”
* * *
Ben and Alan continued checking the garbage rooms on each floor, working their way down the stairs to the back door and alley. Behind the theater were several 55 gallon drums for the building’s garbage collection. They lifted the lids and checked each to no avail. Ben gazed down the alley towards Pine Street to the north and then up the alley to Pike Street.
“He wouldn’t have gone out front,” said Ben.
“I agree,” said Alan.
“Let’s check the cans on the way up to Pike and call it good,” said Ben.
As they checked the next building’s cans a figure stepped out of the doorway near the end of the alley, staggered and pushed his hand against a brick building, catching his balance. As the man tilted his head forward to unzip his fly, the oversized helmet on his head slid down the front of his face, and he had to catch it and push it back. Hands shoved out through over-sized sleeves of a police tunic.
Without saying a word to each other, Ben and Alan double-timed it up the alley and slowly surrounded the skinny dark man muttering to himself.
“Lorenzo Rice!” said Ben, startling the man.
Rice stopped urinating a moment, but then promptly continued. “Sorry, officers, but it hurts too much to stop once I start. You going to arrest me?”
“Not tonight, Lorenzo,” said Ben. “But you can’t be wearing that coat around, making people think you’re the police.”
“You like my coat?” asked Lorenzo. “You want to buy it?”
“If you throw in the helmet and tell me where you found it, I might be interested,” said Ben.
“You got twenty dollars, and it’s all yours.”
“That’s too rich for my blood, Lorenzo. I’m thinking for $2.00 you can buy yourself a bottle of Jack and disappear for two days.”
“Two dollars ain’t squat, Officer...I forget your name.”
“Kearney. Ben Kearney.”
“That’s right, Big Ben Kearney, and who’s your partner? I never remember you having no partner before.”
“This is my partner, Detective Alan Stewart,” said Ben. “We work together on special projects, and you look like you’re wearing one of our special projects. I could arrest you for public intoxication and confiscate the get up, but I think giving you a few bucks for protecting this special project for us is only fair.”
“Fair is right,” said Rice. “Don’t you forget that. I think ten dollars would be more fair.”
“Oh, I see where this is headed,” said Ben. “You drive a hard bargain, Lorenzo. I’ve got an Abe Lincoln in my wallet, and I bet you want every penny of that.”
“That’s right, I do,” said Rice. “How many pennies is that?”
“I’m thinking 500 all together. What about you, partner?” Ben said to Alan.
“That’s what I come up with,” said Alan. “You take Abe Lincoln and you can trade it at any bank for 500 pennies.”
“That’s what I want then,” said Rice, as he slid out of the coat. “I want that Abe Lincoln of yours and you can have this old coat.”
“All right,” said Ben, “but promise me you won’t spend all those pennies on food or a warm place to stay tonight.”
Lorenzo thought for a moment and then grinned widely. Chuckles followed. “You don’t have to worry about that, Officer Kearney. I ain’t gonna waste 500 pennies like that. No, sir!”
* * *
Ben took the helmet and tunic and stood underneath a streetlight. “Metropolitan Police,” Ben read from the ornate cluster on the front of the cork and felt helmet. “British Bobby’s custodian helmet, not one of ours, so most probably one that St. Laurent’s company brought with them.”
Ben handed the helmet to Alan for his inspection and held up the navy blue tunic. “Seven button front,” he said, “which is pretty standard from a few years back, but we’re going with five now—and this has a sewn on belt, which would never do for us. You’d never be able to unfasten all this and draw your weapon from under your coat when you needed it.”
“That’s always bothered me,” said Alan. “How come you don’t wear your revolvers on the outside of your uniform where you can get to them?”
Ben shook his head. “Image and tradition is all. Seattle’s leaders wanted that friendly English bobby look with no weapon visible. They didn’t want a Wild West sheriff with a low slung holster roaming the streets, scaring people away, making them think we’re uncivilized. A lot of good policemen died during the early years, especially during Prohibition, because they couldn’t draw their guns when they needed them. More often than not they died with guns still in their holsters.”
“That’s a shame.”
Ben held up the embossed buttons to the light. “They’ve also got M.P. initials,” he said, “which fits with the London Constable theory. If this uniform doesn’t turn out to be evidence in a crime, it looks like I bought myself the beginnings of a police memorabilia collection.”
Ben methodically searched each pocket, dipping his fingers in and carefully exploring. Reaching into the inner breast pocket, he pulled out a folded piece of paper and opened it. He read out loud: “‘Filipp. We are in grave danger. Remember all in your prayers to the Holy Father. Anna.’ Dated June 21, 1918.”
“Any significance?” asked Alan.
“I don’t know. We’ve got an old coat here, so there’s no telling how long the letter’s been inside of it, let alone who wrote it and why. Nice feel to the paper,” he said, rubbing the stationery between his fingers, “and you know my rules for collecting evidence: keep it until you know you don’t need it. If you toss it, that’s when you’ll wish you’d kept it.”
Ben refolded the letter and put it back in the coat pocket.
10
Ben and Alan sat across from each other in a booth at the
Five Point Café, studying the newspaper account of last night’s fire at the Paramount. At deadline the Post Intelligencer placed the body count at six fatalities with another twenty-nine injured treated at local hospitals. The newspaper expected the numbers to rise after fire investigators had time to sift through the ashes.
“Doesn’t say if that includes the man in the coffin,” said Alan.
“They missed that detail,” said Ben, “but they remembered Alexander’s prediction. They’re making hay with that.”
“What do you make of it?”
“By all accounts, I’m a college educated man,” said Ben, leaning over the newspaper and keeping his voice low, “so I don’t believe in hocus pocus and mentalists one damn bit. I’ll also tell you I’m not superstitious, but if I spill salt I throw it over my shoulder, and I also knock on wood when saying something I hope won’t come back to bite me. I tell myself that’s not superstition, I just don’t want to tempt fate, take any chances. But this makes me wonder. I’d like to say he got lucky with a wild guess, but this is spot on specific. Either he’s got a gift of some kind or he knows more about this.”
“Like who did it?”
“Exactly.”
Alan closed his eyes a moment and nodded. “Vera and I are with you on the superstition.”
Ben sat back and glanced up.
“We’re with Ben on what?” asked Vera as she stopped behind Alan and rested a hand on his shoulder.
Alan scooted across his seat toward the window, making room on the end. Vera slid in next to him, her legs rubbing up against his as she got comfortable. He liked it that way, her being comfortable with physical closeness and touching. He hadn’t been around that kind of closeness before. That wasn’t how his family behaved. He liked this friendship and savored her company, which made him feel alive, always energized with her arou
nd.
“We were talking superstition and Alexander’s prediction,” said Alan.
Vera shrugged and nodded. “What’s with that anyway? I try to be open to things I don’t understand or can’t explain, but all this sleight of hand is just that—it’s manipulation. Once you know how the tricks are done, the principals behind them that is, you can figure out the new ones, but an out of the blue prediction like this doesn’t have thin wires attached, or smoke and mirrors for that matter.”
“You think there’s a criminal plot and he knows who did it?” asked Ben.
“He calls himself ‘Alexander—who knows all’,” said Vera.
“I’m thinking we need to ask him what he really knows,” said Alan.
“Me, too,” said Ben. “As a showman, I imagine he keeps Vera’s hours,” he said, glancing at his watch.
Vera flashed her confident, make-men-weak-at-the-knees smile. “Had to get my company tucked in bed last night, but they were excited and we stayed up till the wee hours, a good old fashioned girls’ sleepover. It’s probably just as well that Jenny’s in school. I’d say we had a pajama party, but none of the other girls had any to wear, so we went with panties and bras, with boobs everywhere.”
Ben rolled his eyes toward the ceiling and sucked in his cheeks.
Alan closed his eyes dreamily. “Wish I could’ve been the fly on the wall.”
“If the girls saw a fly on the wall with a boner, they’d squish it and pull its wings off.”
“Ouch!” said Alan.
“And you trust these homeless waifs in your apartment without you or Jenny home?” asked Ben.
“Those girls have other skills for making money,” said Vera. “They don’t need to steal from me. Besides, there is a sisterhood for girls who work the stage. We look out for each other.”
“What kind of skills?” asked Alan.
“I’m not saying who does what, but girls who work the circuit have been known to date for profit after hours.”
“Seriously?” asked Alan.
Vera nodded. “Highest bidder wins their affection for the evening. That’s true in my former business, too, but not always, not for everyone. The world would like to think we we’re all whores, but that’s not true. I just happened to be comfortable with my nudity back then, but my days of taking clothes off for money are over, if that’s going to be your next question.”