“I will. You do the same. And for pity’s sake, Miranda—for the sake of my blood pressure—stay away from federal penitentiaries, OK?”
She cracked a laugh, and hung up the phone.
* * *
No answer at the number James gave her, so she left a message.
Nothing too specific, nothing too obvious. She owed him the information he’d asked for, but he’d need to collect it directly. Maybe Miller was bluffing, maybe he wasn’t, but Hoover and his trigger-happy troops weren’t gonna gum up the works, not now, not when she was on the point of saying good-bye and maybe even hello. She wasn’t sure how much pull James had, how much power, and the Cameronia seat had been too hard to come by.
Miranda pulled the phone closer. Two more phone calls before she could brace Smith.
She dialed Meyer’s number, starting to worry when the ring count passed five. His lightly accented voice finally answered.
“Meyer?”
“Miranda? How are you, my dear? What—what time is it?”
“About twelve fifteen.”
“Twelve fifteen?” He cleared his throat, sounding embarrassed. “I have been rather tired the last few days…”
“You needed to sleep, Meyer, for God’s sake. You were up all night with Louise—”
“Miss Crowley! How is she?”
“The doctors expect her to live and said she’s showing signs of regaining full consciousness. They’re hopeful it’ll happen today.”
“Thank God.” The lawyer spoke quietly, reverently. “I thank the Holy Mother for her intercession.”
Miranda’s voice was sober. “She might wake up with brain damage, Meyer.”
“She will be well. I am convinced of it.”
“I hope you’re right. Listen, I just wanted to let you know about Louise. Get some rest. I’ll phone with any developments.”
“Thank you, my dear. I have some case work to review, as a matter of fact, so”—long yawn—“Excuse me—it is very fortuitous that you called.”
She smiled. God, she’d miss Meyer, her attorney, her former client … her friend.
“Be seein’ you, Meyer. Sweet dreams.”
Miranda lowered the heavy black headset back into the cradle and stared thoughtfully at the phone. She picked it up again, closed her eyes until she remembered the number, and dialed.
Two rings.
“Alexander Publishing, Bunny Berrigian speaking.”
“It’s Miranda Corbie, Bunny. Louise is gonna make it. We’re just waiting for her to regain consciousness, and they think it’ll happen today.”
The whoof of relief came over the phone’s receiver, Bunny’s voice scratchy. “Well, thank God for doing something right. Poor kid. Thanks for letting me know. Listen, I’ve gotta run—”
“I do, too. Any editors in the office today?”
“Just Hank. Why?”
“Might want to visit some in their natural habitat later.”
“Then try the nearest bar. Say, I should let you know—Sylvia’s out of Greer. She and Roger are getting married.”
Miranda sat back against the black leather chair, eyes blinking. “Married? Isn’t that a bit—soon? I saw Roger yesterday and he said she’d tried to harm herself … didn’t sound as though she were ready for the real world, such as it is—not that Greer is anything other than an expensive clip joint, but still…”
Bunny sighed. “I know, I know. At least they’re not tying the knot until after the memorial. I think they said Monday at City Hall. Listen, I really do have to go—”
“When you say ‘they,’ I take it you mean Roger, right? You haven’t actually spoken to Sylvia?”
“Nope, I saw them both. Swooped in like two lovebirds to tell me the happy news. She seemed more stable than I’ve seen her in years, so I’m happy for her. She’s recuperating at home.”
Miranda frowned. One fast about-face from the woman Roger described as suicidal …
“Thanks, Bunny. I might drop in later. Keep your fingers crossed for Louise.”
“You bet I will.” The redhead spoke fervently.
Miranda hung up the phone once more, staring thoughtfully into space.
She shook herself, threw a couple of packs of Chesterfields in her purse and checked for the Baby Browning.
It lay in the cigarette case, loaded and ready, dark brown dull against the shiny gold.
Little gun, insignificant weapon to a man like Martini, until she blew his brains out against a bathroom wall.
Red and white, red and white, and the sick, soft splatter, pop-bang reverberating, around and around and around …
Miranda closed her eyes. That was seven months ago and Smith was no Martini. Alexander’s death, the attempt on Louise—whoever was behind it was no professional, even if there was a connection with the Rock.
She took a breath and walked through the office door, locking it behind her.
Glanced up and read the letters on the glass, black paint starting to chip:
MIRANDA CORBIE—PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR.
No sense in repainting. Before too long, someone else’s name, someone else’s office.
Someone else’s door.
She stared at the words until they blurred, then walked down the empty fourth-floor hall, shoe taps ringing on the gray stone floor.
Twenty-Eight
Miranda leaned back, shielding her eyes, and stared up at the Cathedral Apartments, 1201 California Street, just a country club application away from Grace Cathedral.
Nob Hill, still home to nobs and snobs and members of the Pacific-Union Club, yanking strings with the mayor and God, the closest hill to Heaven in San Francisco.
They controlled the market, controlled the banks, and tried like hell to control the unions, though they couldn’t control Harry Bridges, so they kept trying to deport the poor bastard, Red Menace always more threatening than simple German businessmen.
She took in the long, golden lines of apartments and expensive hotels, the stately private temples to commerce and capitalism and silver mines, the private chauffeur lounging against a Bentley, smoking a cigarette, the woman in the leopard coat looking at a packed cable car, simply too amused.
Nob fucking Hill.
What passed for old money in a City built by cheats and frauds and the sweat of gold fever, and built again by optimists and dreamers and sharp-eyed newcomers, the kind who recognized an opportunity when it burned down around them.
It was a long slow skid down to the plants and factories on the other side of the city, the cheap apartments on Laguna, the creaking boardinghouses along Telegraph Hill, even to the Monadnock and the De Young Building, where railway companies hawked vacations to Tijuana and private detectives chased sweaty husbands in out-of-town hotels and newshawks pounded out fairy-tale stories about the sugar cane heir and his snowbird girlfriend … one mistake, a misspoken word, a sudden raise in rent and an even farther tumble to the Tenderloin and Chinatown, where Blind Willie sold pencils and No-Legs Norris pushed himself through slop-filled alleys on a platform made of plywood, where Chinatown beat cops held assignations in dim alleys, and B-girls retired, old, at the age of twenty-one.
Miranda sniffed the cool air, breeze blowing through her hair as she held on to her beret.
No plywood here, not for Howard Carter Smith.
She hit the buzzer, number 602. No sleek-haired young manager behind the desk today.
A man she’d been watching stepped away from the shadows, smoking a cigarette. About forty with a gut, face covered in stubble, hair cut close to his scalp under the stained brown fedora.
He took three steps forward, got a better look at her, and sauntered back to the shadows, resuming his lean against the cold stucco.
She glanced over and he tipped his hat.
Her lips twitched a smile, and she pushed twice more, short staccato bursts designed to wake up a drunk and irritate the neighbors.
She waited thirty seconds then held down the immaculately white butto
n, buzz grinding through the sedate lobby like the wrong fork at dessert.
A door slammed somewhere above, and footsteps thudded down the steps, muffled by a well-bred carpet.
Smith.
He was wrapped in a blue silk bathrobe, monogrammed, thin hair plastered to his head, skin ashen and gray, chin and cheeks unshaven. His thick body jerked and stumbled its way to the door, which he flung open, eyebrows knitted together in a long line of rebuke.
Miranda squeezed in before he could open his mouth.
Her eyes flickered over him, from the lamb’s wool slippers to the HCS emblazoned on his chest. His robe was stained and sweaty and he smelled like Scotch and dried puke.
“Invite me upstairs, Smith. We need to talk.”
* * *
He wavered while he stared at her, trying to figure out who she was and why she’d pried him off a couch and into the cold, hard world of responsibility.
“You—you’re that, that dick-lady, Corbie—”
“Congratulations—you got my name right.” She looked around the lobby, from the dust-free crystal chandelier to the purple orchids on the eighteenth-century marble-and-gold table, poised like a butler by the staircase.
“No elevator? Let’s walk.”
His forehead wrinkled. “Elevator’s ’round the corner. What’re you doin’ here, lady? I thought—I thought I told you to dust last night…”
Miranda started up the stairs, footsteps barely registering against the blue carpet, gold balustrade shining.
“I’m not that easy to blow away, Smith. I suggest we talk upstairs—that is, unless you want your neighbors to know why you’re such a popular boy down at the Hall of Justice.”
He blinked a few times, waking up, thick body drawing itself together, muscles tightening. He pulled his robe together more securely, frowning, and climbed after Miranda.
His voice was a growl. “Second on the left, sixth floor.”
She didn’t bother to reply. Smith started to pant after the third-floor landing, and was breathing hard by the time they reached six.
The door to #602 was a thick number, highly polished. Smith coughed, fumbling in his robe pocket. “I forgot my fuckin’ key…”
“Did you even lock it?” Miranda pushed on the heavy door and it noiselessly opened about a foot.
Smith glared at her, and proceeded inside. She pulled it shut behind her.
The apartment looked like something out of one of those Joan Crawford or Ginger Rogers pictures where the girl makes good or makes bad or somehow climbs all the way from a department store counter to a ritzy penthouse.
The theme was pale wood, lots of gold and white and yellow, modern, angular furniture and a wide view of the Bay, which she could just glimpse in the small opening of the shut drapes. No clutter and surprisingly few books, with one small wooden case lined with Smith’s own and a few, select editions of other writers. Opposite doors presumably led into a kitchen and dining-room area on one side and the office, bathroom and bedroom suite on the other.
The living room itself was a standard arrangement of expensive chairs, glass tables, and a large, overstuffed sofa. A thin wool blanket and silk pillow lay crumpled against the blond fabric. Below, specks of vomit still clung to the long, tan fibers of plush carpet, a small puddle, not yet cleaned up.
Smith noticed her looking and mumbled: “Maid’s off today.”
She shrugged and sank down in an armchair. “Mind if I smoke?”
“I mind you being here, lady. So cut to the chase.”
“I’ll take that as a ‘no.’ Why don’t you put on some coffee, Smith? I’m gonna be awhile.”
The thick-bodied man glared at her, eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot. Then he padded through the swinging door on the right, and Miranda could hear him opening cupboards in the kitchen.
She lit a Chesterfield and exhaled, looking around. An empty bottle of gin and half a bottle of Van der Hum still littered the glass coffee table, along with an overflowing ashtray and about three dirty glasses.
Smith barged back through, looking considerably more awake.
“Emily Post’s satisfied, Corbie. Now talk.” He threw himself down on the couch, inelegantly sprawled, small brown eyes still blurry and mean.
Miranda blew a cascade of blue smoke. “That’s your job.”
“Listen, lady, I’m two seconds away from phoning my attorney and throwing you out on your ear—”
“No, you listen, Smith, and listen well. Crosby’s not gonna get you out of talking, not today. Two people have been murdered—two people connected to your Alcatraz book.”
The writer’s face contorted in a recalcitrant snarl.
“And I’ve got the same thing to say to you I say to the coppers—not my fucking problem. So why don’t you—”
“‘Not my problem’? Such a man of the people, Smith. Such a muckracker. I’m surprised Steinbeck lets you into Monterey.”
“John knows I can buy the drinks. And don’t question my politics, Corbie—you’ve got no goddamn idea.”
She bent forward, tapping ash in the overflowing crystal tray. “Oh, I’ve got an idea. And I’m not the only one. Try J. Edgar Hoover on for size.”
The stocky man blinked a few times and sat up straighter, arm off the couch and hands in fists on either side of his body.
“Hoover? The Bureau? What are you talking about?”
“Alcatraz, Smith. The Rock. I paid a visit to Associate Warden Miller and a bull named Linkletter this morning. I put cards on the table and you were the fucking ace. But Miller didn’t want to play and threatened to call Hoover. Linkletter’s his goon—capable of murder, I’d say—and from their reaction, it looks like you stumbled on some information either about them or related to them, information that your book contained and that George Blankenship was going to use to blackmail them with.”
She inhaled the stick while color cascaded over Smith’s pasty face. No words, not from the man who arranged them for money. His stubby fingers clutched at the monogrammed robe.
“You mentioned my name? Told them about my book?”
“I just said so. Whatever you’ve been hiding, whatever you wrote, whatever sordid mess you dug up on Alcatraz, your surprise party is over. Maybe you’re too stubborn or stupid to realize you’re in danger, maybe even from the same men, and frankly, I don’t much care if you pay the price for it. What I do care about is that you’re endangering people, innocent people. I don’t know how much money you think you stand to gain from rewriting the Alcatraz book, Smith, but you’re no Lincoln Steffens or even John Spivak, and the charade’s gotta end—now.”
She ground out the stick in the crystal tray.
The writer swallowed, face now ashen and red around the eyes. He looked up at Miranda.
“My family—if Hoover finds out about my—Jesus, it could ruin me.” He ran a hand across his forehead. “All right, I’ll talk. Seems to be the only way to protect myself.”
He stood up unsteadily and walked toward the portable bar, pouring a shot of rye into a shot glass. A faint hissing noise wafted under the door to the kitchen.
Smith mumbled, without looking at her, “I’ll get the coffee. How do you take it?”
“Black.”
He was gone for under a minute but long enough for Miranda to take out her reporter’s notebook and jot down “Ask Bente about Smith.” He backed through the swing door, hands full with two cups, and handed her a jadeite mug before heading back to the bar, pouring another stiff shot into his coffee.
“Easy, Smith—I need you to stay sober.”
“This won’t even make a dent. What do you want to know?”
The writer seemed almost pathetic, arms heavy, mouth drawn downward.
She sipped the coffee and set the cup down on the glass table, taking up the notebook.
“Understand this is as off-the-record as I can make it, but Fisher will need some details.”
Smith waved a hand. “Doesn’t matter. Not now.”
“Why would Blankenship want to use the book for blackmail?”
He shifted nervously against the couch. “I can’t—can’t be sure, because I never mentioned Miller specifically—too much of a legal risk—but the name ‘Link’ was in the margin notes of the original manuscript before Niles edited it. So were some other names.”
“In what context?”
The thick-bodied man gulped the coffee and whiskey before looking away from her, facing the draped window.
“I talked to a couple of men who knew Gardner—”
“Roy Gardner?”
“Yeah. And others who’d made it out. The book wasn’t just about Alcatraz, you know, but that’s how Niles wanted to slant it—that’s why he had me rewrite some of it a few weeks ago, to make it all about Alcatraz.”
“Go on.”
“What they told me—well, it’s about the guards. Not all the bulls, mind you, there are a lot of good men in these prisons. But the BOP didn’t used to be so choosy, and from what I’ve heard they’re trying to clean up their act, boot the crooked ones.”
Miranda was scribbling words furiously. “You mean they took bribes?”
“Bribes? Oh, hell, yeah. That’s expected. Jailbirds get a whole list of the ones to hit up, prison by prison. You pay to access the information, and it’s maintained, inmate by inmate, passed along to other men in other prisons when they get transferred. You get better food, privileges, privacy—pay the bulls to look the other way. You can even crack the joint, if you’re willing to take the risk—that’s how Cretzer and Kyle made the break at McNeil—they got to the right guard at the right time.”
“So Blankenship wanted to steal your book because Cretzer and Kyle were transferring to Alcatraz and you were about to blow the lid off the bribery?”
Smith scratched his chin. “You tell me. Cretzer said he knew he could bust out of Alcatraz—he’d been briefed on the bulls to pay off. I asked him if that were so why Kelly and “Creepy” Karpis were still there. He just smirked and said Kelly was there because he wanted to be there, and he was running things from his cell. Cretzer’s goofy, a dangerous sonofabitch. I didn’t trust what he told me, but Alexander shat in his pants when I told him I got that interview. Blankenship’s girlfriend, the one who got killed—didn’t she have something to do with Cretzer?”
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