SW05 - The Wrong Gun
Page 28
“Who’s that?”
“Crumbly’s wife.”
“You mean she probably knows about it and if I work on her she might break?”
“It’s the other way around, Vaulding. You know, for an elected official, you’re not very politically correct. For my money Crumbly’s a pretty weak tool and I wouldn’t be too surprised to find the missus was the brains behind him.”
“Son of a bitch,” Vaulding said.
“Yeah, but if so, I’ll bet she’s a tough nut to crack. The way I see it, it’s more likely you’ll get him to rat on her.
“But these are details, Vaulding. They can wait. The press won’t.”
“Right,” Vaulding said. He paused in the door. “Give me one more thing. Odds are these guys won’t talk until tomorrow, so any prediction I can make in the papers makes me the golden boy. Aside from running, give me one more thing indicates these guys were the perps.”
“O.K.,” Steve said. “You got Crumbly’s testimony. About him meeting Timberlaine at brunch and Timberlaine asking him to bid against Burdett.”
“What about it?”
“Well, that’s gotta be part of the plan, right? They’re framing Timberlaine so they gotta give him a motive. You twist Timberlaine hard enough, I’ll bet you’d find the idea of having someone else bid did not originate with him.”
“Right. They planted the idea. That’s obvious. But why does that implicate Crumbly?”
“Burdett’s testimony was that the deception did not fool him in the least.”
“Right,” Vaulding said. “It was only meant to fool Timberlaine.”
Steve grinned. “Right. But from Timberlaine’s point of view it was supposed to work. According to Burdett’s testimony there was no way it could have worked. Crumbly didn’t bid on that kind of gun and Crumbly never bid that high.”
“Yeah, so?”
“So Crumbly had to know that. He’s not stupid. But here he is, agreeing with Timberlaine to go along with this great scheme. Bullshit. Crumbly more than anyone else knew that his bidding on that gun was out of character for him and would tip Burdett off. Yet he did it. Why? Because that was the whole point. To furnish a motive for Timberlaine killing Potter. You dig around, I’m sure you’ll find the idea that Potter tipped off Burdett was indirectly planted by one of the conspirators too.”
“Yeah, right,” Vaulding said. He hesitated.
“That’s not enough for you?” Steve said. “What about Martin Kessington having the key to the gun room so he had the opportunity of switching guns? Or Crumbly and his wife being gun collectors, and therefore having the avenues to move them? Plus what Burdett said about the Crumblys not having any money, which is why they’d get involved in the ripoff in the first place.”
“All right, all right,” Vaulding said, putting up his hands. “I’ll take it from there.” He took a breath. “Look, I took a chance on you, I’m glad I did. Thanks.”
Vaulding stuck out his hand. Steve shook it.
Vaulding nodded to Mark, “Mr. Taylor,” then to Tracy, “Ms. Garvin,” then hurried out the door.
“How about that,” Tracy said. “He actually called me Ms.”
“Nothing surprising about that,” Steve said. “When we made our deal, it was practically a prerequisite.”
“Well, I’d still have liked to hear him say it in open court.”
“Take what you can get,” Taylor said. “Well, whaddya say we get out of here?”
“Hang on,” Steve said. “Give Vaulding a chance to get the reporters in tow. I don’t feel like walking out of here into the arms of the press.”
“You and me both,” Taylor said. “You can bet one of them would be bound to ask the wrong question.”
“Yeah, like what happened to the other gun,” Tracy said.
Mark Taylor almost gagged. He threw up his hands, then put his finger to his lips.
“What’s wrong with you?” Steve said.
“Oh, nothing. But this is not our office, and who knows what sort of equipment our host has.”
“Relax,” Steve said. “Even if Vaulding recorded every word we said, I guarantee you there is nothing that would make him go back on what he’s telling the press right now.”
“Even so.”
“Oh, don’t be such a worry wart,” Tracy said. “Tell me, what are you going to do about that gun?”
“There isn’t a river deep enough,” Taylor said. “Right, Steve?”
Steve considered a moment. “Actually, Mark, I thought I’d hang it on the wall.”
Taylor’s mouth dropped open. “What?”
“Yeah. Don’t you think it would look good over my desk?”
“Steve, don’t joke. You don’t know how much sleep I’ve lost over that gun.”
“Who’s joking? Safest place for it. Look, if I try to get rid of it and get caught, I’m screwed. No way I can ever explain. If I hang it on the wall, no one will give it a second thought. People who make the connection at all will say, ‘Hey, is that a gun from the Pistol Pete case? You handled that, didn’t you?’ I’ll just smile and say, ‘Yes, I did.’ After all, there’s so many guns in the damn case, no one’s gonna figure out which one this is.”
Taylor exhaled noisily. “Jesus Christ,” he said. “I hope you’re pulling my leg. But what the hell. Right now I’m so relieved I couldn’t care. Listen, we gotta stay here, I need a drink. This hotshot D.A. got a bar?”
“In the corner.”
“Do we dare?”
“Under the circumstances, I can’t see how he’d begrudge us.”
Taylor went to the bar, rummaged around, came back with three brandy snifters. He passed them out, raised his and said, “Here’s to crime.” He took a sip, exhaled with satisfaction. Took another sip and chuckled.
“Feeling a little better, Mark?” Steve said.
“I was thinking about Burdett coldcocking Crumbly.”
“Wasn’t that something?” Steve said.
“I’ll say. That pudgy guy sure packed a wallop.”
“Did you see him when court broke up?” Tracy said. “Before they led Timberlaine off. He goes up to him, throws his arm around his shoulders like they were the best of pals.”
“Nothing strange in that,” Steve said.
“Why? I thought Timberlaine hated his guts,” Taylor said.
“Yeah, but they’re adversaries. It’s a special relationship. In a way, it’s more personal than being friends. A good rival, one who puts up a good fight—well, you don’t have to like the guy to respect him as an opponent.”
“Funny you should say so,” Tracy said.
“Oh?”
“I was thinking about you and Vaulding. He was a pretty good opponent, wasn’t he?”
“That he was.”
“Except now,” Taylor said. “I don’t get it. The guy was givin’ you fits for most of the trial, now he’s in here asking you for explanations like he hasn’t got a clue.”
“That’s not so surprising,” Steve said. “The man spent the whole case gearing every theory to the fact Timberlaine was guilty. He’s had just this morning to adjust to the idea he might be innocent. It’s like every notion he had was pulled out from under him. If you consider that, he’s doing fine.”
“And when you consider how fast the evidence jumped around,” Tracy said. “‘Keep your eye on the gun.’ Boy, was that ever prophetic.”
“Why’d you give it to him?” Taylor said. He jerked his thumb. “The press, I mean. Like you said, you could have pulled this off without telling him at all.”
“Which wouldn’t have been fair. If the guy’s decent enough to play ball, he should have a chance to play ball. There’s a bottom line here. Vaulding didn’t want to win if it meant convicting an innocent man.”
“Of course not,” Tracy said.
“There’s no ‘of course not’ about it. Some do. Vaulding deserves credit for not being one of them. And if this case gets him reelected, hey, it’s nice to know we got a frien
d in this county.”
Mark Taylor set down his glass. “Can we go now?”
Tracy held up her hand. “In a minute. Let’s finish the postmortem.”
“What more is there to say?”
“There’s a lot more to say. Look, Steve, I heard what you said to Vaulding. And I’m sure a lot of it’s true. What I want to know is, how in hell did you figure it out?”
“Oh, that was easy,” Steve said.
Tracy exhaled. She snatched off her glasses, folded them up, put her hands on her hips. “I knew you were going to say that,” she said. “Now, then, you infuriating man, at the risk of being strangled, would you tell me what you mean by that?”
“Well, I should think it’s obvious,” Steve said. “Considering the fact this all started with Timberlaine inviting us out to his mansion for the weekend, then the whole bit with the switching gun and the people changing rooms and the body on the floor of the gun room—all the elements of your basic mystery novel—well, considering all that, and considering who Martin Kessington was, the solution was obvious.”
Tracy frowned. “What do you mean?”
Steve grinned, ducked his head and moved well out of Tracy’s reach before answering.
“The butler did it.”
Books by Parnell Hall
Stanley Hastings private eye mysteries
Detective
Murder
Favor
Strangler
Client
Juror
Shot
Actor
Blackmail
Movie
The Wrong Gun
Scam
Suspense
Cozy
Manslaughter
Hitman
Caper
Stakeout (2012)
Puzzle Lady crossword puzzle mysteries
A Clue For The Puzzle Lady
Last Puzzle & Testament
Puzzled To Death
A Puzzle In A Pear Tree
With This Puzzle I Thee Kill
And A Puzzle To Die On
Stalking The Puzzle Lady
You Have The Right To Remain Puzzled
The Sudoku Puzzle Murders
Dead Man’s Puzzle
The Puzzle Lady vs. The Sudoku Lady
The KenKen Killings
$10,000 In Small Unmarked Puzzles (2012)
Steve Winslow courtroom dramas
The Baxter Trust
Then Anonymous Client
The Wrong Gun
The Naked Typist
The Wrong Gun
The Innocent Woman (2011)