A Tax in Blood

by Benjamin M. Schutz

  “When you called yesterday you mentioned murder. Do you have anything to support that notion or is this the old bait and switch, Nate?”

  “Would you have come over so quickly if I’d said anything else? Time is of the essence on this case. I wanted to get you here to hear me out. What do you say?”

  “All right, I’ll take the case.” I struggled with the impulse to shaft Nate on the fee. His contingency deal with Ms. Vasquez would probably gross him close to sixty thousand dollars. I held to my standard rate. “Three-fifty a day plus expenses.”

  “Reasonable expenses,” he countered.

  “No way, Nate. Jesus’ll be back before ‘the reasonable man’ shows up. You’ll pay my expenses, period.”

  Nate said okay. He was in obvious pain.

  “Who was the investigating officer?”

  “A Sergeant Sproul. Wilfort Sproul. He’s assigned to the second district.”

  “All right. He’ll be my first stop. I’ll prepare a contract for services. Have one of your couriers pick it up at my house first thing tomorrow. I’ll come by for it and a three-day retainer about noon.”

  “I’m in court all day tomorrow.”

  “Okay. I’ll be here at five-thirty. Have it ready or I walk.”

  “No problem.”

  I got up to leave and turned to the widow. “One question. How did your husband know that you’d be here?”

  “I told him. Under the terms of the temporary custody decree, he was to pick the children up at the house at three-thirty. It was his turn to have them for the weekend. I told him that I’d be late picking them up from school, that he could get them after four o’clock. He asked me why I was going to be late so I told him. I guess I shouldn’t have but I was tired of having to answer to him.”

  “Okay. I’ll be in touch as soon as I find out anything.” I could tell she was thrilled. I left her one of my cards and let myself out.

  On the way down to my car I thought how easily and predictably Nate had gotten me to his office. Just holler murder and here comes Haggerty. It made me sound like a vulture. I wasn’t sure I could argue with that.

  Chapter 6

  I ransomed my car and took M Street out of Georgetown. Once around the circle at George Washington University Hospital to Pennsylvania Avenue, then down past ground zero and across the mall towards the river and the police station.

  In the lobby I asked them to ring Sgt. Sproul. The officer at the switchboard handed me the phone. “Vice. Schwartz here,” a voice rasped.

  “Uh, I was trying to reach Sgt. Sproul in homicide.”

  “Hold on.”

  “Sproul here.”

  “Sergeant, my name’s Haggerty. I’m a private investigator retained by the family of Mr. Malcolm Donnelly to investigate the cause and manner of his death. Would it be possible to see a copy of your report?”

  “Yeah, come on ahead. I’m doing it right now.”

  “Fine.” I handed the phone back to the switchboard man who got confirmation from Sproul. “Take the staircase at the end of the hall. Homicide’s on the third floor. Sproul’s off at a corner desk,” he said.

  “Thanks,” I said and went off to find Sgt. Sproul.

  Wilfort Sproul was as black, hard and shiny as anthracite. His bony face gleamed, courtesy of a malfunctioning heating unit that had turned the third floor into a sauna. In shirt and shoulder holster he typed away at the report. After the barest acknowledgment of my presence, he said, “Have a seat. Be with you as soon as I finish this thing.”

  I sat down, took out my note pad and flipped it open. Sproul leaned back, cracked some vertebrae, pulled a pack of Luckies out of his shirt pocket and said, “Let me see your license.” I took it out of my wallet and handed it over to him. “Who hired you?”

  “Nate Grossbart. He’s representing the family.”

  “What’s his number?”

  I gave him the number. Sproul called Grossbart and got confirmation of our relationship. He put down the phone, lit up a Lucky, yanked the report out of the carriage and handed it to me.

  It was straight to the point. Malcolm Donnelly checked into the Presidential Arms on Fourteenth Street at three P.M. on Friday. He was alone and took a room for the night. He made no long distance calls and did not eat dinner at the hotel. The next morning, at approximately eleven A.M., the maid entered his room and found him sitting in the chair next to the night stand. He was quite dead. The investigating officer found no signs of violence, or of forced entry. No one had come to the desk asking for Mr. Donnelly. His car had not left the garage. The parking sticker stamped 2:52 was still on the windshield. Mr. Donnelly had not gone down and requested a cab to take him anywhere. He apparently hadn’t left his room at all. It had rained all Friday afternoon and evening. The clothes he wore were unwrinkled and there were no water marks on his shoes. The desk clerk identified them as the clothes Donnelly had been wearing when he checked in. He had no raincoat or umbrella. His wallet was in his coat pocket with thirty dollars cash and all his credit cards. Nothing seemed to have been stolen. No, Mr. Malcolm Donnelly quietly, civilly, peacefully, checked into a hotel, went up to his room, closed the door, sat down and died. The end.

  I looked at the copy of Donnelly’s bill and the picture of his car with the sticker still on it. I noted the maid’s, doorman’s and desk clerk’s names.

  “Were you the officer on the scene?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So, all the stuff here about property, clothes and so on, you personally saw and okayed?”

  “Yeah.” Sproul’s eyes narrowed and he blew smoke out of his nostrils, slowly.

  “Who was the M.E. on this?”

  “Carrington.”

  “Is the report ready?”

  “Not yet. I can tell you what the preliminary said.”

  “Which was?”

  “He had some pills and booze in him. Tranquilizers or antidepressants. He apparently checked in with a bottle of gin in his bag, had a few belts, popped some pills, sat down and just stopped breathing.”

  “He drinking alone?”

  “Yeah, one glass used, and the others accounted for. No sign of any company at all.”

  “Where’d he get the pills from?”

  “Don’t know. Didn’t have the bottle on him. M.E. said there were just traces though. Some kind of fluke reaction.”

  “Doesn’t that sound like an accident?”

  “Yeah, but I still got that letter to account for.”

  “Tell me about the letter.”

  “Same old, same old. You’ve seen one you’ve seen ’em all. Life sucks and I can’t take it anymore.”

  “Can I see it?”

  “It’s down with the M.E. When his report comes up the letter will be attached. You can see them both then.”

  “Suppose I told you that this guy’s wife says he was itching for a fight just the day before, promising a bloodbath in court and making all kinds of accusations?”

  Sproul smirked. “I’d say it’s just her and her shyster lawyer. They’ve got an insurance policy riding on this finding. Gimme a break. We’ve got a cause of death and two choices: accident or suicide. I’ve got a note at the scene. Typed, sure, but it’s signed. I can’t see it any other way and neither can the M.E. Go back to your client, tell her she married a shit and he’s shafting her from the grave. That’s tough but that’s the way it is. I’ve got work to do. Queer over on Ransome Street wound up a fruit salad in his trash compactor. Lover’s quarrel, no doubt.” Sproul dismissed me with a backward wave of his hand.

  I got up and left. Trotting down the station house steps, I remembered the old joke about the Southern Sheriff’s verdict when a cement-clad, bullet-riddled black man was dredged up from his river: “The worst case of suicide I ever saw.” I didn’t think Sproul would like my point.

  Chapter 7

  In the car I made some notes. I wanted to see the M.E.’s report and the letter. I’d ask Ms. Vasquez about her husband’s clothes and wallet.
Most of all I wanted to reconstruct Malcolm Donnelly’s last day. Somewhere between Nate Grossbart’s office and the hotel room I just might find out why he died. Last but not least, I thought I’d ask the receptionist at Grossbart, Shaftweiler and Nicoletti to tell me about Malcolm Donnelly’s visit. I used my car phone to call the hotel. No one that I wanted to talk to was on duty. They’d all be there tomorrow, I was assured. I got Marta Vasquez’s number from Nate’s secretary and called her. No answer.

  It was a little after three. Pretty soon the city’s arteries would start to clog up and all the drivers would get hypertensive. Traffic jams make me crazy. I decided to beat the herd out and head for home.

  I pulled into my driveway before four, scooped up my mail and let myself in. Dumping the mail on the kitchen table, I called my answering service. No messages. I flipped through the mail. This month’s Video Newsletter, Washingtonian and Rolling Stone went into one pile. The junk mail I stacked up and tossed out. I opened the bills, arranged them by due date and put them on my desk. There was one check. I gave that a big kiss.

  I poured myself an inch of John Powers, sat at my desk, typed up a contract for Nate Grossbart and called his office.

  “This is Leo Haggerty. Please, have your courier service pick up my contract for Nate Grossbart at my office at nine A.M.”

  “Of course, Mr. Haggerty. Mr. Grossbart left instructions for that. Could you confirm the address?” She read it off to me.

  “That’s right.”

  “Fine. Our courier will be there at nine.”

  “Very good.” We hung up.

  I transcribed my notes and made up a file headed VASQUEZ/DONNELLY. Back in the kitchen I scooped up my magazines to read and put a Talking Heads tape on. When I was done reading, I turned the television on for any further word about the bombing at the wall.

  The six o’clock news was signing on when the special report logo appeared. Oh Christ, here were go again. The reporter on screen was from a Los Angeles station. “A bomb has gone off atop the interchange of the Hollywood, Harbor-Pasadena and San Bernardino freeways. The bomb was apparently what is called an F.A.E. bomb, or fuel-air-explosive. The explosion blew out the roadbed causing it to collapse on the lower levels. The ignited fuel set fire to the cars on the road. Those that were unable to stop in time fell through the holes, crushing cars below. A number of people were trapped in their cars as the fireball spread. Others abandoned their cars and fled on foot. Traffic in this area is backed up for miles in all directions. Even where I am you can feel the heat. It’s incredible. The police are asking people to stay put so that emergency vehicles can reach the disaster site. From where I am you can see the central fire and the twisted concrete and metal of the roadbeds. They look like the charred carcass of some giant animal. Every once in a while a smaller fireball appears when a car’s gas tank explodes. You can see people climbing over wrecked or abandoned cars, trying to stay ahead of the flames. Now you can hear sirens in the distance. It’s just too hot to go in after people. Unless they can get out by themselves, there’s just no way to help them.”

  I turned the television off. A new stop has been opened on Trans-Terror Airways. See America and have a blast! In the silence I felt the first tendrils of the terror planted among us.

  I got up and wandered through the house, round and round, like a piece of unclaimed luggage. My agitation was as much from missing Samantha as it was from the terrorist attacks. I knew from yesterday that reading wouldn’t distract me so I locked up and drove over to Tysons Corner to see Aliens. As promised, it got my attention. I watched the movie twice, once to be frightened and once to savor the damnedest movie about motherhood I’d ever seen.

  I sacked out around eleven and slept well until I dreamt that I was riding a horse through a narrow canyon. As the canyon became ever narrower all the riders had to move into a single file. Slowly we crept through the canyon, unable to speed up or turn back. In the distance I heard a whooshing sound followed by long screams. Finally, I looked up the sheer sides of the canyon walls and saw a giant standing astride the ravine. As the riders passed between his legs his giant blade came down and cut the riders in half. I looked around for a way out but there was none. No way to turn back, and no way out of the canyon. I looked up and saw the giant sword descend on me. I was.… awake. Bolt upright and panic-stricken at three A.M., I tried to forget that the giant had Arnie’s face.

  Chapter 8

  My resident jazz woodpecker woke me with his syncopated rat-ta-tat-tat. I was considering taking a shot at him, when the phone rang. Reluctantly I picked it up. “Hello.”

  “Mr. Haggerty, this is your answering service. A Ms. Vasquez has been calling. She’d like you to call her immediately.”

  I took down her number. “Thank you.”

  Wonderful, wonderful. I levered myself up to a sit, stood and walked into the bathroom. Fifteen minutes later I was ready to deal with Ms. Vasquez and the world. I walked into the kitchen, poured myself some coffee and dialed Marta Vasquez’s number.

  “Ms. Vasquez, Leo Haggerty. I understand that you called me?”

  “Yes. I was at our bank yesterday. I found out that Malcolm had looted our account. That asset was to be frozen until we’d made a property settlement. He’d closed it out and then opened one for himself at the same bank. But he didn’t put all the money in the new account. Five hundred dollars was missing. When the police gave me his effects, his wallet had only thirty dollars in it. I want that money found.”

  “Hold on a minute. What did the bank say about the transaction?”

  “They couldn’t find the deposit slip yesterday. But they said that if I came down today, they’d show it to me. He either had them issue a bank check or took it in cash. If it was in cash then he was robbed, don’t you see?”

  “I see.” He could also have opened an account elsewhere or spent it later that day. “Ms. Vasquez, when they turned over your husband’s effects to you, was there anything unusual, a purchase he might have made, that would account for the missing money?”

  “No. I recognized everything in his suitcase.”

  “Was there anything in the car?”

  “I didn’t look.”

  “Would you, please. Trunk, glove compartment, under the seats, behind the seats, ashtrays, spare tire well, above the visor.” If it was hidden better than that we’d need Waldo the Wonder Dog to sniff it out. “When are you going to the bank?”

  “I was going to go over as soon as it opened—at nine o’clock.”

  “Would you mind waiting for me? I’d like to talk to the bank people myself.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll be there, say, nine-thirty. Where do you live?”

  She gave me the address. Just as I was about to hang up, she said, “Oh, call Mr. Grossbart. He had something to tell you. I think it was the doctor’s report.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you in about thirty minutes.”

  Nate’s courier banged on the front door. I got my contract and gave it to him. Then I picked up the phone to call Grossbart.

  “Law offices.”

  “Nate Grossbart, please.”

  “Who shall I say is calling?”

  “Leo Haggerty.”

  “Thank you.”

  Nate was on the line immediately. “The pathologist’s report is ready, Leo.”

  “Nate, what pathologist’s report are you talking about? The M.E.’s report isn’t even ready yet.”

  “I know, I know. I decided not to wait for those schmucks to get around to it. Toxicology screens have to be done immediately if there are traces of poison in the system. So I hired a private pathologist, Harvey Bliss, to do the work right away. Here’s his number, 555-0878, call him, listen to him.”

  “All right, Nate, I’ll be in touch with you.” I dialed Dr. Bliss’s number.

  “Bliss, Moeller and Wendkos.”

  “Dr. Bliss, please.”

  “Hold on.”

  “Harvey Bliss speaking.”

>   “Hello, Dr. Bliss, my name is Leo Haggerty. Nate Grossbart said I should give you a call, that you’d done some toxicology screens on Malcolm Donnelly.”

  “Yes, that’s right. Hold on, let me get the report.”

  I doodled a note to myself to remember to ask Marta Vasquez about her husband’s car.

  “Okay. In a nutshell this is it. The preliminary report from the M.E. was on the money. Malcolm Donnelly died of respiratory failure brought on by the interaction between alcohol and a meprobamate compound. Time of death was between five and six P.M.”

  “You said interaction, not overdose?”

  “That’s correct. The blood levels on the drug were under three milligrams per, so he didn’t take too much of the drug. But its interaction effects with alcohol are quite powerful. Only a little bit of the drug in his system, and only a little bit of alcohol I might add, are necessary to precipitate a coma and respiratory arrest.”

  “Would this be a rapid sequence of events?”

  “Yes, most likely.”

  “What kind of drug would this compound be?”

  “It’s an antianxiety or antidepressant medication.”

  “Both?”

  “Well, it’s used with certain depressed patients who are extremely agitated.”

  “Who would prescribe such a medication?”

  “Psychiatrists, internists, general practitioners, usually. I doubt that it was prescribed, though. The amount in his system was not a therapeutic dosage. He didn’t have enough in his system to do him any good.”

  “But just enough to kill him, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Thank you, doctor. Is there anything else?”

  “No, that’s it.”

  I kept doodling on my notepad. Five hundred dollars? Time from bank to Grossbart to hotel? Maids? Sproul? Medical history?

  Chapter 9

  Marta Vasquez lived in an older residential section of northwest Washington. The house was a red brick box with a screened-in side porch. I knocked on the door and was greeted by her in a black silk dress, a little short and slinky for mourning. She waved for me to enter. “Be right with you, Mr. Haggerty.”