Everybody Wanted Room 623

by Cecil Murphey

  “No, I didn’t think you would. I mean, what is there to implicate me? I mean, I only operate the front desk—”

  “And have access to the room keys.”

  “Yes, I do, but I have never, ever used—”

  Ollie shrugged indifferently.”

  “Honest, sir. Never. Not once.”

  “And there’s one more thing, Craig Bubeck. Were you ever away from the desk last night? I mean, even once during your shift?”

  “Oh no, I wouldn’t—” He stopped. “Okay, I was gone for maybe five minutes.” His eyes pleaded with us. “I smoke. It’s against the rules. I told the Cartledges that I had quit, but—”

  “So you went out for a smoke. Where did you go, Craig Bubeck? To room 623 perhaps?”

  “Why would I go there? No, I went out the side door of the inn and got into my car. The windows are tinted, so no one could see—”

  “But you had to walk past the elevators to get to the side door. Am I correct?”

  “Well, uh, yes, but I didn’t—I didn’t go to room 623 or to any other room. Honest, I—I—I just went to sneak a smoke. That’s all.”

  “And you want us to believe you, don’t you, Craig Bubeck?”

  “Yes, of course I do.”

  Ollie squatted in front of him and said, “I would like to believe you. So here’s how I can believe you. You return the diamonds and I’ll believe you.”

  “But I don’t have them! I don’t know anything about them.”

  The poor man perspired, and I saw fear in his eyes. I also believed him.

  “I’m reasonably sure we can assist you and get you some slack on your new prison sentence because you came voluntarily and gave us information.” Ollie stared into the man’s brown eyes.

  “What are—are you crazy or something? I don’t have any diamonds. I don’t even know anything about any diamonds. What diamonds are you talking about?”

  “You didn’t know about the stolen diamonds from room 623?” Ollie asked.

  “Diamonds? Is that the reason for the murder?” He shook his head. “I saw on the TV and in the papers about the murder. They said robbery was the motive, but I didn’t know it involved jewelry—”

  “Not just jewelry,” Ollie said softly. “It involved diamonds. Millions of dollars worth of cut diamonds.”

  “Search me. Search my car.” He pulled his keys from his pocket. “Search my apartment. You won’t find anything.”

  Ollie walked around the chair several times and glared at the poor man. Finally, he said, “You know what, Craig Bubeck? I believe you—”

  “Thank you— ”

  “I believe you because I don’t think you’re smart enough to pull off a job like this. It’s too big for a little man like you. You’re just too small, too simple, and lack the courage to do anything big.”

  The words obviously hurt Craig. I saw it in his eyes, and I started to object, but Burton held up his hand to silence me.

  This time I ignored Burton. I walked over and touched Craig lightly on the shoulder. “The detective sometimes acts like a bully,” I said. “Don’t take it personally.”

  “How do I not take it personally?” he asked. I thought the poor man was going to cry. “He’s not a very nice person, is he?”

  “I’m sorry you have to go through this,” I said.

  “Can I go now?” he asked Ollie.

  “Do you have anything else to tell us?”

  “Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” he said.

  As I watched his face, I knew he was lying. He held back something. But I understood. If I had been in that chair, I wouldn’t even have told the big man my name.

  Craig got up and started toward the door. I touched his shoulder. “I am sorry.” I lowered my voice and said sotto voce, “We’ll talk later. Okay?”

  Craig blinked twice.

  He smiled.

  Fifteen

  “You acted like a cold, insensitive beast to that man,” I said to Ollie. “That poor man.”

  “I thought it was a pretty good imitation of Rod Steiger in that old flick where he played a Southern sheriff. Did you notice how I continued to use his full name and talked softly and condescendingly and yet with authority?”

  “Oh, I noticed,” I said. “You were convincing, all right.”

  “It was a little heavy-handed,” Burton said.

  “Yeah, well, that’s how it works sometimes.” He nodded slightly and said, “You’re right. Sometimes I rush things too much.”

  I tried to decide if I ought to give him the benefit of a few more words about how much I hated what he did. “You hurt that man. You didn’t need to act that way.”

  “Okay, you’re right,” Ollie said.

  Just then his cell rang, and he opened it and said, “Yes.” His hand wasn’t shaking, and I realized something rather obvious. When his hands shook the worst, he was harsh and vile tempered. When they weren’t shaking, he acted as if he played some kind of role in a film. He was truly a strange man.

  After a brief silence, he said, “Send him in. We’d love to talk to him.”

  Ollie motioned for Burton and me to sit, and he went to the door. As soon as someone knocked, he opened it halfway and kept the other person in the hallway. We could hear only muffled voices. In less than a minute, Ollie returned and a man followed him. He introduced Lucas Lauber, Stefan’s older-but-adopted brother.

  I was amazed because there was a strong family resemblance. Like Stefan, he was lean and sinewy. Although Stefan’s hair was dark, Lucas’s hair was a medium brown, neatly trimmed and salt-and-pepper. His features were sharp and economical, as if God hadn’t been in the mood to waste anything the way He had edited Lucas’s genetic file. He had hazel eyes and a long nose. Although he wore no tie, his expensive dress shirt indicated that he felt more comfortable in that then he did in anything sporty. His suit trousers were charcoal gray with a thin blue pinstripe. My guess is that the suit must have set him back at least a couple of thousand dollars.

  “You look a great deal like Stefan,” I said.

  “Our parents tried fourteen organizations before they picked me. They wanted a skinny kid that would look like his brother. They wanted people to think we were truly birth brothers.” He smiled in what came across as deprecating. “I was the right age—six years older—and had the right body style and hair color.” He laughed. “But Stefan’s hair darkened to deep brunet. Mine stayed a lighter shade of brown.”

  “Did you like your adopted brother?” Ollie asked.

  “Do you mind if I sit down?” Lucas asked and sat without waiting for a reply. “Did I like him? That would depend on which period of time you’re asking about.”

  “Oh, not another long-winded—”

  Burton put out his hand. “Mr. Viktor is tired, so please forgive him.”

  He gave Lucas his heart-melting smile and said, “Tell us about your feelings for the past three or four years and move on to the present.” He looked at Ollie. “Okay?”

  “Yes, of course,” Ollie said. He actually sounded courteous this time.

  “It started maybe four and a half years ago, perhaps even five, when I learned that Stefan had cheated me. I’m not positive about the time element, but it was long before the diamond robbery. Months at least. Perhaps a year or even two.” He closed his eyes as if he could visualize the past. “I still had my office in what used to be called the Bank of America Tower at Peachtree and North Avenue. Pat Fields hadn’t yet become—”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Burton said. “We have an approximate time.”

  “Your relationship with Stefan. Do you want to tell us about it?” I asked. That’s always a good, neutral question for therapists to ask when they can’t think of anything else.

  “Of course,” Lucas said. “The first thing you should know is that Stefan was one of the most insightful, most savvy investors I’ve ever known. It was as if he could smell good deals.” He paused and shook his head. “You’ve heard of Google, I assume. That w
as one of the last big-profit deals he ever made. He initially invested a small amount—small for Stefan—of $40,000 and then another $600,000. It made a fortune for us.”

  “For us?” I asked.

  “We were business partners. He was the risk taker, and I was the numbers counter—as Stefan called me. I played safe. I didn’t make the huge profits on investments the way my brother did, but I never lost anything either.”

  “Did Stefan lose a lot of money?” I asked.

  “Do you mean on investments or on people?”

  “Tell us about his investments in people.” Ollie leaned forward. His voice was exactly the right tone to elicit information.

  Maybe he’s not really so bad, I thought.

  Lucas cleared his throat and waved away a bottle of water that Burton held up. “Pam Harty—she was the worst, but there had been a few unwise decisions before. He liked women—perhaps he liked too much variety in women and ran from affair to affair. Several of them cost him a few hundred thousand, but nothing big until she came along. I assume you know about Pam Harty. You do, don’t you?”

  We shook our heads.

  “Really? I assumed you knew everything about her, the affair—sorry, my brother liked to call it the romance—but whatever anyone calls it, the whole thing was an awful situation. So far as I have been able to understand, she was the cause of the problem. He never blamed her; in fact, he refused to say much about her, even though she took him—us—for close to four million dollars.”

  “And he never blamed her?” I asked. “That seems strange to me.”

  “No, never. ‘It was a weakness in me,’ he told me when I confronted him. ‘Pam was a thief, but she only exploited that weakness. She didn’t cause it.’ That’s as close to his exact words as I can remember.”

  “Sounds noble of him,” I said.

  “That wasn’t his reaction when I first learned of the theft. He said that later—much later.”

  “Tell us a little more, please,” Ollie said. “Help us. Explain it to us.”

  “It starts easy and simple enough. Pam Harty went to work as a personal assistant to Stefan perhaps seven years ago. For the first couple of years, she was the total sponge—the kind of employee everyone wants. She wanted to know everything and was available to take on any job, no matter how trifling. She often said, ‘Please teach me, Mr. Lauber.’ Stefan loved that, by the way. If anyone wanted to get on his good side, just ask him to teach you. And to his credit, he was an excellent teacher.”

  “And? But?” Ollie asked softly. “What happened?”

  “Pam bewitched him or something. I have no idea how this all came about, but somehow she twisted his thinking. She guided him into making several shrewd deals, very shrewd, I must say that much.” He paused and turned to Ollie. “Is that important? If not, I’ll go on.”

  “Oh, please go on,” Ollie said. “This is new information.”

  “We can always come back to any of that if it’s important,” I said.

  “Yes, of course,” Lucas said. “I don’t know all the details, but Pam totally and absolutely bewitched him.”

  “In what way?” I asked.

  “Without permission—without my express permission—he invested one hundred million dollars in some oil scheme in East Africa. There is no oil in East Africa. Because it’s part of the rift that begins in the Middle East and continues through the heart of Africa, some entrepreneurs claimed they had strong indications of oil. There has never been any oil found there—not a drop. It was some kind of con game that Pam either started, played, or cooperated in. She bilked him. That much is clear. She had an array of falsified documents and geological surveys. She brought in experts with thick accents and impressive-looking credentials. They were all part of the scheme. She bilked him totally. Then, of course, she disappeared. She left with the firm’s money, which was mine, as well.”

  “Did you go out of business?” Burton asked.

  “For six months I assumed we would, but we did recover—barely.” He shook his head. “I lost almost everything, but by giving heavily from my own portfolio, I was able to save the company. Stefan had taken money that belonged to other investors. And I mean taken. He had forged their names to documents. I could have made life bad, real bad for him, but I knew it was the allure of that woman.”

  “Did you prosecute?”

  “No. Stefan did turn over one of his personal accounts, which helped save the firm from bankruptcy. Just one, and he could have done more, but that plus the money I pitched in was enough to keep us solvent.”

  “You’re saying Pam Harty left no trace behind?” I asked. “You didn’t think you could find her or—”

  “We did investigate. We hired a firm of discreet investigators. Apparently she had taken on the identity of a woman who died in a car accident years ago.”

  “So you let it drop? You did nothing?” Ollie raised an eyebrow. “That’s a lot of money to lose—”

  “I saw no way to recover the money. If word leaked out that our firm had been taken by such deception, we never would have recovered. In the end I chose to do nothing.”

  “Okay, so tell us about Stefan,” Ollie said.

  “Did you ever reconcile?” I asked. “You and Stefan?”

  “Well, that’s a long, long story.”

  “I don’t mind listening to long stories,” I said before Ollie could interrupt.

  “Yes, we’ve already heard a few today,” Ollie said. This time he laughed.

  “When Stefan was in prison—you know that jailhouse-religion thing? He wrote me a long letter. It was ten handwritten pages, and he asked me to forgive him.”

  “Did you forgive him?” Ollie asked.

  “Absolutely not. I believed he was sorry for the wrong things.”

  “What do you mean by ‘the wrong things’?” I asked.

  “I’m sure this sounds strange to you, but he seemed most upset about himself. He had been hoodwinked. He had been taken advantage of by Pam Harty or whoever she was. He had violated the trust placed in him. It was all about him. It was as if nothing else mattered but that he was able to be forgiven so he could clean up his dirty little conscience.”

  “I suppose that would have been hard to accept,” Burton said.

  “He had no regard for what he had done to me—the pain he had caused or the months of strain and worry—”

  “That was when you received the letter, right?” I asked.

  He nodded slowly. On his right hand, he wore a large ring with diamond chips. He twisted the ring several times as he spoke.

  “You never reconciled?” Burton asked.

  “Later,” he said. “Yes, later we did.”

  “What happened later?” I asked. “Did you forgive him?”

  “You mean after he repaid the money he had stolen?”

  “He repaid it?” Ollie said. “One hundred million dollars and he repaid it? Hey, come on—”

  “No, it’s true. That’s when I was willing to consider forgiving him.”

  “ ‘Consider’ means you didn’t?” I asked.

  He smiled sadly. “He gave me the access code to a numbered bank account in the Cayman Islands. I took out enough to repay everything.”

  “Those things really exist?” I asked but felt embarrassed. “Sorry, I’ve read that kind of thing so often in books or seen it in films that I wondered.”

  “But he paid you back the whole amount?” Ollie questioned. “I find that incredulous.”

  “Incredulous or not, there was enough in the account.”

  “Enough? How much was enough?” Ollie asked. “How much was left?”

  “I’m not sure that’s relevant, but I took out enough to pay me back for all he had, uh, borrowed of mine, after I covered our investors. He had nearly eighteen million dollars left, so he wasn’t going to suffer when he got out of prison.”

  Ollie whistled and repeated the amount.

  “He had at least one other account. That was in Zurich. That’s a
ll I know, but it would not have been a small amount.”

  “He must have been a sharp investor,” I said. “I mean, really sharp.”

  “Brilliant. Except, of course, for the incident with Pam.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Ollie said. “And it’s a good thing she didn’t get it all.”

  “He was in love with her,” Lucas said. “He was beguiled by her, but he wasn’t totally stupid.”

  “Okay, let’s move on,” Ollie said, “but I can’t believe that crook would have made everything good.”

  I shook my head at Ollie and turned back to Lucas. “And when did you meet again—in person? I know it was at least once while he was in jail at the state prison in Hall County.”

  “How did you know we had connected again?”

  “Just tell us when.” Ollie sounded more like a therapist than a detective. “Please.”

  Lucas stared at his hands and played with his ring. His head bobbed slightly as if he were arguing with himself. “He wrote maybe three or four times and asked me to come see him, but I refused to meet with him.”

  “And why was that?” the detective persisted.

  “I didn’t like my brother. As I’ve already said, I resented him, and I knew he had never liked me, even from the first days together in our childhood. I was good to him, but I detested the spoiled brat. He got whatever he wanted, and quite often he did so at my expense.”

  “And as children, what did you get?” Burton asked.

  “Leftovers. Always what was left after he got what he wanted.” He looked up briefly and went back into the staring mode before he finally said, “Okay, I really have nothing to hide. I detested him. I didn’t shoot him, although at one point I probably would have said that whoever did it might have done me a big favor.”

  “Because?” I asked.

  “Because he got the big inheritance and I received half of what he did. Our parents insisted there was no difference between us, despite his preferential treatment. But when they died—both died in a head-on collision when I was twenty-five—it showed how they truly felt. I was worth half as much to them as he was.”

  “So shouldn’t you blame them and not Stefan?” I asked.