Flynn

by Mcdonald, Gregory, 1937-2008

  "She picks up her husband at his office, drives him to a restaurant on the harbor where they have a late supper and a lot to drink. She drove him to the airport. That's significant. It indicates she'd had less to drink than he had. The old boy had a skinful."

  "I see."

  Grover placed the car against the curb in front of Zephyr Airways and turned off the ignition.

  "Here at the airport she takes out, she thinks she takes out, a half a million dollars' worth of flight insurance on the old boy. Pretending she didn't know there was a one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollar limit on flight insurance may have been part of her blind—so she can have some evidence that she didn't know what she was doing."

  "Yes."

  A state policeman in a slicker was ambling toward the car.

  "She sees his baggage checked through, to be put on the airplane. Even she says that it was she who packed his bag and that he never looked into it."

  The trooper banged his fist with extraordinary force against Flynn's window.

  Flynn ignored him.

  "Then she says she went home and went to bed by herself and the next morning didn't even know the Goddamned plane had exploded all over the Goddamned sky just after takeoff."

  Flynn said, "I still don't see any new evidence."

  The trooper banged on the car window almost hard enough to break it.

  Flynn slowly rolled down the window and looked at the cop.

  "What do you want?"

  "Get this car out of here! No parking against this curb! Move it!"

  Flynn said, "No/' and rolled the window back up again, slowly.

  He said, "From what you say, Grover, I still don't see what possessed you to arrest the Fleming woman."

  Grover said, "Everyone knows the Judge's son is a compulsive gambler."

  "Everyone?"

  "Everyone."

  "I had to find it out, myself."

  The trooper was banging his fist, hard, on the top of the car.

  "No offense intended, Inspector," Grover said, intending an offense, "but you're not a cop."

  "Ach, well. I'll be the first to admit that."

  The trooper was banging harder on the car roof.

  Flynn rolled down his window halfway.

  "Cut that out," he said.

  He rolled the window up again.

  "Probably the kid, Charles Fleming, Junior, was heavy in debt again."

  "I suspect he is," said Flynn.

  "Now does it make sense to you?"

  "No," Flynn said. "We don't know that Chicky was at the airport. Secondly, Chicky is not the beneficiary of whatever insurance there is. His stepmother is." Flynn began to get out of the car. "I don't think you know anything more than I do, Grover."

  "I don't," Grover said. "But you're blind."

  "That may be."

  The trooper was at the front of the car, copying down the license number.

  "Think of a thirty-one-year-old broad with a pink motorcycle and a fifty-three-year-old husband."

  "I have been," said Flynn.

  He stood on the sidewalk.

  Grover shouted at him over the wet roof of the car.

  "You can't tell me that lady had eyes only for her husband!"

  "Maybe not," said Flynn.

  The trooper slammed a piece of cardboard against Flynn's chest with incredible force.

  "This is the most expensive ticket you've ever gotten, Buddy!"

  Flynn let the ticket flutter to the wet sidewalk.

  "Now get this car the fuck out of here!"

  Flynn said, quietly, "Buzz off."

  Over the car roof, Grover said, "Inspector, you still don't get the point."

  "Inspector?" said the trooper.

  "Mrs. Fleming is thirty-one years old, and her stepson is twenty-six."

  "Ah!" said Flynn.

  The trooper moved around the front of the car, toward Grover. "Inspector?" he said.

  "Ah!" Flynn was looking across the car roof at Grover. "That's what you're thinking?"

  "That's it," said Grover.

  The trooper said, "Is that Inspector Flynn?"

  Grover said, "Aw, fuck off."

  Sergeant Richard T. Whelan got into the car, slammed the door, and sat there.

  "Humph," Flynn said to the trooper. "That's what he's thinking."

  Flynn took a step to the curb and opened the passenger-side car door. He bent over and stuck his head inside the car.

  Behind the steering wheel, Grover was staring straight ahead, arms folded across his chest.

  "You believe," Flynn said, "that Sassie killed the Judge because she's in love with Chicky?"

  "I do," said Grover.

  "By God. If only the FBI had perceived the full clarity of your thinking, they never would have called me to complain!"

  On the sidewalk, Flynn flipped the expensive parking ticket with the edge of his shoe toward the state trooper, and said, "You're littering."

  Twenty-four

  Flynn found Paul Kirkman in the corridor of the Zephyr Airways Passenger Services offices.

  Even at the end of his workday, Kirkman looked freshly pressed and groomed.

  "Hello," Flynn said.

  "Hello, Inspector."

  "I'm not precisely sure what it is I want," Flynn said.

  "Who among us mortals does know precisely what it is we want?" Kirkman grinned. "Come into the office."

  The fluorescent lights in the little office came on in waves.

  On Kirkman's desk was a large cardboard illustration of the interior of a 707.

  There were handwritten notes on it, with arrows pointing to some of the seats.

  Kirkman stood behind his desk.

  Flynn said, "What's this, now?"

  "Just something I did." Kirkman flipped the illustration around, so Flynn could read it. "I thought somebody might want it. I noted specifically where some of the passengers were sitting."

  "Not all of them?"

  "Not all of them had assigned or reserved seats. Just

  the first-class passengers did. Unless the coach passengers made a specific request, they were just split into two groups, smoking and nonsmoking."

  "I see," said Flynn. "But I see you went to a good school—I can't read your handwriting at all."

  Kirkman came around the desk and stood beside Flynn. He ran his index finger down one row of seats. "You see? McCarthy, Hoag, Cairns, I can't read that name myself, Norris, Goldman, Wilcox—"

  "I see. And where was Daryl Conover, for instance?"

  "Over here. In 15-D."

  "How can there be Row 15? There are only twelve rows of seats in first class."

  "All the row numbers are double digits on Zephyr aircraft. Per orders of the interior decorator, or the designer, or some other genius. Has something to do with the graphic design of the little number plaques they put on the chair arms, or something. Causes a lot of confusion. People getting on the plane always overshoot their seats and immediately have to start backing up in aisle traffic. The front row of seats on the plane is Row 10."

  "So," said Flynn, "the twelve rows in first class are Rows 10 through 21, inclusive?"

  "22," said Kirkman. "There is no Row 13."

  "Ah!" said Flynn (N. N. 13). "The bad luck number!"

  "They were all bad luck numbers, on this flight."

  "And where was Leeper sitting?"

  "Back here. With his manager. Row 22, Seats C and D. Of course, we don't know which man was in which seat."

  "And Judge Fleming?"

  "The other side. Up here. Row 14, Seat A."

  Flynn said, "Then he was really in Row 13, wasn't he?"

  "I guess so. Or Row 4."

  "And those three men traveling together?" asked Flynn. "Carson, Bartlett and Abbott?"

  "They had these three seats," Kirkman said. "Row 17, Seats A, B, and, across the aisle, C."

  "Did they, indeed?"

  Kirkman straightened his back. "I don't know why I bothered to do this." A
gain, he went behind his desk. "Busywork, I guess."

  Hat still on, overcoat opened, Flynn was staring into Kirkman's face.

  "What's the matter, Inspector? You look like a fly just flew down your throat."

  After another moment, still staring at Kirkman, Flynn said, "You're a neat fellow."

  "Thank you. Have to be in this job."

  "Dealing with passengers all the time," Flynn said. "I think you work hard at keeping up the image of Zephyr Airways."

  Kirkman sat down. "I do."

  "That's the point," said Flynn. "You were seeing the passengers off on Flight 80 to London at three o'clock in the morning." Flynn put his hands on his hips under his open overcoat. "They had come from four points of the globe, including Boston. At that hour of the morning, your personnel is not at full muster. Right?"

  "Right."

  "You were standing there, in the departure area, dressed in your Zephyr Airways blazer, and what did you have in your hand?"

  "Nothing."

  "You had a beer can in your hand."

  Kirkman had to think a moment, to remember.

  "You took a can of beer away from Percy Leeper as he was boarding the plane."

  "Yes."

  "What did you do with it? You couldn't throw it in a wastebasket because it was open and still had some beer in it."

  "Right."

  "However, it would be against your instincts, your training—your image, if you will—to stand anywhere in the terminal in your Zephyr Airways blazer with a can of beer in your hand. Right?"

  "Of course."

  "What did you do with it?"

  "I started back to the offices with it. Back here."

  "I would say that finding yourself with a can of beer in your hand, you started back to your offices immediately."

  "Yes."

  "You started back sooner than you normally would have?"

  "Yes. I started back immediately."

  "Before the door to the airplane was closed?"

  "I don't know. I'm not sure."

  "Is it possible?"

  "Yes."

  "All right, Mister Kirkman. You said yesterday that Percy Leeper was the last person to board the airplane."

  "I think so. He was about the last to board."

  "You also said yesterday it was most likely the stewardesses wouldn't have seen the boarding passes on this flight—that they would have been collected at the entrance to the jetway."

  "I think they were."

  "So, not having collected the boarding passes, not

  being responsible for how many passengers were actually aboard, an empty seat on the plane would not have been particularly noticed by a stewardess?"

  "We would have gone looking for a passenger or passengers, Inspector, only if the boarding passes hadn't tallied. And they did." Kirkman glanced at the wall clock. "I don't see what you're driving at, Inspector."

  "I'm considering the possibility that someone boarded that plane, and then left it. You wouldn't have seen him. You were already headed back to your office with the can of beer."

  "The stewardesses would have seen him."

  "I'm not sure of that, either," Flynn said. "You said passengers at that hour of the morning, especially on a transatlantic flight, are apt to be fussy and demanding. There was bound to be some confusion in the aisles. There always is. Secondly, you add the element of Percy Leeper. About the last person to enter the plane, you said. An extremely exuberant, well-built young man, bandages and welts on his face, jumping with joy—in fact, the boyo who had just won the world boxing championship. . . . You can't tell me he didn't turn the head of every stewardess on that plane."

  "Inspector, we went over this yesterday. Why would anybody, who was supposed to be aboard that plane and wasn't, not come forward by this time?"

  "Precisely."

  "Anyway, the CAB and Baumberg say the bomb wasn't planted in the passenger section of the plane. It was planted in a cargo hold."

  "I know."

  "So why would anybody enter the plane, and then leave it?"

  "To give you a boarding pass."

  "I don't get it."

  Flynn straightened the brim of his soft tweed hat.

  "It's always dangerous to reduce human beings to pieces of paper," he said. "Some human beings will take advantage of it and present back to you a piece of paper rather than themselves."

  "Is that what happened?" Kirkman asked. "Is that what happened here?"

  "It may have," answered Flynn. "It may have."

  Twenty-five

  "There's a pawnshop up here somewhere." Flynn rubbed the condensation off the inside of the windshield with his right fist. In his left hand he held Cocky's map. "There it is. Pull over."

  Grover braked hard, nearly in the middle of the street, and turned off the ignition.

  "Good," Flynn said. "The devil's own establishment of despair is open for business. I won't be a minute."

  On the sidewalk he put his face close to the wet grille over the steamy plate glass of the store front and peered at the collection of cameras, guitars, radios, trumpets, battle ribbons, jewelry, televisions—and violins. He looked especially sharply at a violin at the back of the window display—one without much dust on it.

  "I can hear its old sweet song from here," Flynn said to himself.

  Just inside the store, he pointed to the violin in the window and said, "I'll see that violin, if you please."

  A voice from behind the cage at the back of the shop, an elderly man's voice, said, "Can't you see it from there?"

  "I'll have it in my hands."

  "That violin's not for sale," the voice creaked.

  "You're damned right it's not!"

  Flynn snatched the violin from the window by its neck and marched with it to the pawnbroker's grille.

  "That one," the pawnbroker said, "there's still a ticket out on that one."

  "Then what's it doing in the window?"

  Through the grille Flynn could see a white-haired little man in a white shirt too big for him, stacking coins on the counter. The little man shrugged.

  "This is my son's violin," said Flynn.

  The little man shrugged again. "It is if he brings the pawn ticket back. With money."

  "And how much money do you expect?"

  The man studied the coded ticket dangling from the neck of the violin through the grille. "A hundred dollars for that one."

  "Are you telling me you lent out a hundred dollars on this violin?"

  "Sure. It's a good violin. Play it a little/*

  "Where's the bow?"

  "Pick it a little."

  Flynn sounded the Astring with his thumbnail.

  "You don't know how to play the violin," the pawnbroker said, "so you pick it a little. You don't know how to pick, either."

  "By God, he's not only a pawnbroker, but a music critic to boot!"

  "Put the violin back in the window, will you, Mister? It's not for sale yet."

  "Actually," said Flynn. "I'm taking it home with me."

  The little man looked at him owlishly through the grille.

  "Without," Flynn added, "paying you a dime."

  "Look, Mister. Whose fault is it your son pawned his violin to me?"

  "My son!" Flynn pretended astonishment. "You mean the kid who pawned this violin was redheaded?"

  The pawnbroker studied Flynn's own thick brown hair.

  "Yes," he said. "He was."

  "Good!" Flynn pretended relief. "My son is blond."

  The old man's gaze went into Flynn's eyes.

  "You bought stolen property," said Flynn.

  "Mister, there happens to be a law in this state protecting pawnbrokers from charges of buying stolen property."

  "There is?"

  "Everything we buy, everything we lend money out on—we can't be sure the person selling the goods to us actually owns it."

  "There's entirely too much law," said Flynn.

  At the side of the shop were a half-doze
n violin cases on the floor.

  Flynn had to study them only a moment before picking out Randy's and bringing it to the cage.

  "Now," said Flynn, "have I ever been in this pawnshop before?"

  "Maybe," the old man said.

  "Have I been in this pawnshop at any time since this violin case has been here?"

  "Maybe."

  "Did the violin in my right hand enter this pawnshop in the violin case in my left hand?"

  "Maybe."

  "What was the name of the person who pawned this violin?"

  "I don't know."

  "You're not required to ask?"

  "No."

  "The marvelous protection of the law!" scoffed

  Flynn. "Obviously you opened the violin case to take the violin out."

  "Maybe," answered the little old man.

  "And you saw that on the inside lid of this violin case, printed in big block letters, are the initials 'R.F.'?"

  The pawnbroker said nothing.

  Putting the violin on the shelf, Flynn opened the violin case.

  On the inside lid, printed in blue block letters between the bows, were the initials 'R.F.'

  "Did you inquire of the person who pawned this violin if his initials were 'R.F.'?"

  He turned the violin case so the man could see the initials clearly.

  "They might have been the initials of a previous owner," said the pawnbroker.

  "Indeed they are," said Flynn, putting the violin into the case. "The previous and present owner. You did not take ordinary precautions to guarantee that you were not buying stolen property."

  "I don't have to," the pawnbroker said. "The law—*

  "The hell with the law!" said Boston Police Inspector Francis Xavier Flynn. "There's entirely too much of it!"

  "Mister," the little old pawnbroker said, "if you try to walk out of here with that violin, I'll call the police on you."

  "I am the police!" said Boston Police Inspector Francis Xavier Flynn.

  The pawnbroker blinked at him.

  "I have identification here somewhere."

  Flynn rummaged through his pockets.

  He showed the pawnbroker his badge through the grille.

  "You're Inspector Flynn? I've read about you in the newspapers."

  "You're about to read about yourself in the newspapers! You not only knowingly bought stolen "property, you bought it from a minor!"

  Again the man blinked at him.

  "You said it was a boy who sold you this violin.'*