I shot Stanton a hard look and gave a subtle shake of my head.
“I have no idea,” Stanton answered.
“So what are we doing locked up in here?” I asked Ryland.
“Giarelli’s going to go take care of the Secret Service man. When he gets back, he’s going to ask you some questions, Mr. Caine. A lot of them, I imagine.” Ryland looked out the window and shivered for a moment. “Like he asked me.”
The lock turned and the bedroom door opened, Giarelli’s bulk filling the frame. He was dressed in his black pinstripe with a red carnation, and his two men were right behind him, still holding their guns.
“Let’s go, Ryland,” he called out. “Time to pay off the rest of your debt.”
I looked at Ryland, then back to Giarelli, then back to Ryland again.
“You’re going to help them with this?” I asked, incredulous.
“I have no choice,” Ryland said.
“That’s right, he don’t,” said Giarelli.
“You’re a goddamn fool, Giarelli,” I told him. “That kid in there is federal government. You think you can just take him for a ride and be done with it? The law will be all over you. Federal law. You won’t be able to light a cigar in peace.”
“It’ll take ’em six months to a year to find the body.” Giarelli seemed quite calm about the whole business. “And they gotta find all of it. And then they’ll spend another six months or another year trying to identify it.”
“You dumb guinea!” My voice sounded desperate in my own ears. “You’re not going up against a Paddy wagon full of Keystone cops here. We’re talking professional investigators on a federal budget. They have about forty-seven ways to identify a body.”
“No kidding? Then they can try one way for every piece they find. Let’s go, Ryland. I’ll be back to talk to you two later. Johnny here will be standing guard outside the door, so don’t try anything. I’ll want some answers when I get back, and you better have the ones I’m looking for.”
Resignedly, Ryland pushed past me on his way to the door.
“He’s through with you after this, Ryland,” I called after him. “He won’t need you anymore, you’ll just be a liability. And this time it’s not going to be raspberry jam and applesauce.”
Ryland looked back at me, eyes sad and beaten. He already knew that.
Waiting together in the locked room, Stanton and I had time to get to know one another all over again.
“So who are you really?” he asked.
I shrugged. “That other man was telling the truth. My name’s Devlin Caine. I’m a private investigator.”
“Who was that other man?”
“Someone I thought I could trust.” I shook my head slowly in disbelief.
“Who are you working for, Mr. Caine?”
“I’ve been recruited by the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” I said, realizing that this was probably the truest thing I’d told Stanton up till now. “They’re after Casper Giarelli.”
“Surely you’ve told them by now that Mr. Giarelli is in the city. Why don’t they just arrest him?”
“You can’t arrest someone for being a gangster, Mr. Stanton. Not even for dressing like a bad film version of one. They have to have evidence of specific crimes. Collecting that evidence, and especially finding people willing to testify against a man like Giarelli, well, that takes time.”
“Mr. Ryland knew who you were all along,” Stanton said. I shook my head. I’d come as close to the truth with Stanton as I cared to. Now it was time to start skating back to the other side of the rink.
“No. He does now, though.”
“But he presented you to me as his good friend Kelly Shaw. Why would he do that?”
“Because I was paying him, Mr. Stanton. And he needed the money.” Always keep it simple when you can.
“What did deceiving me have to do with pursuing Mr. Giarelli?”
“Ryland owed Giarelli money, remember? Only he didn’t have it because the investment you arranged for him tanked. The feds thought if we brought you back into the picture, Giarelli might believe he had another shot at his two hundred thousand. He might even be willing to do something risky to get it, something the law could nail him for.”
“Something risky like what?” Stanton was thinking quickly and his eyes widened. “That wire recorder. Mr. Caine, are you saying the F.B.I. knew that Giarelli might try something violent? And they were willing to let this happen so they could collect the evidence of it?”
“Law enforcement is serious business, Mr. Stanton. Criminals play for keeps, which means the feds have to as well.”
Stanton shook his head and muttered, “Barbaric.” He was getting more comfortably back into character. He knew now that Shaw was really a private detective named Caine, but he didn’t know that Caine knew Clay Stanton was a confidence man. Always best to keep whatever advantage you can.
“Something else is bothering me about this,” I admitted. “Ryland told us he went along with faking his own murder to help Giarelli throw a scare into us. I don’t know about you, but I was plenty scared already. I mean, we’d already planned to pay him his money, right?”
“Yes,” Stanton agreed, thinking over what I’d just said.
“Giarelli must have known that. What was the point of scaring us further like that? You make a man too scared, he sometimes takes stupid chances, messes things up.”
“The bank in Delaware,” Stanton suggested.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Has to be some kind of connection there. He made us drive all the way out there. And it had to be that particular bank.” I puzzled over this for a moment until Stanton interrupted my thoughts.
“I still don’t follow your purpose in setting up investments through me,” Stanton said. “How would this help the law apprehend Mr. Giarelli?”
“The idea was that Giarelli would think the money I gave you was coming from Ryland, that Ryland was holding out on him. Hiding his money in stocks instead of paying Giarelli back.”
“Where has this money been coming from? I presume, Mr. Caine, that you’re not some eccentric millionaire detective one might see in the movies?” I decided I liked finally being called by my own name. It helped me to focus. Kelly Shaw was a sharp, savvy businessman, all right, a real wheeler-dealer. But Caine was a professional who knew what he was doing.
I shrugged. “Tax money, I guess. These people have access to as much as they need for operations like this.”
Stanton looked at me indignant for a moment.
“You charged me thirty thousand dollars’ interest to borrow money that wasn’t even yours?”
I grinned at him. “I look out for myself, yeah. A man learns to do that in this life or he sinks right to the bottom.”
“And it didn’t occur to anyone that this…operation…might well put a private citizen like myself in danger? As it has?”
“I don’t think anyone expected Giarelli to get this greedy, to openly approach one of Ryland’s business partners. I mean, the feds were hoping Giarelli’d get careless, but I don’t think they saw this coming.”
“And at what point exactly are these civil servants planning to step in and rescue us from this unforeseen circumstance?” Stanton was scared – I could tell that from the angry pique in his tone – but he was playing the part of the outraged taxpayer rather well, I thought.
I looked at him, irritated.
“Don’t be naïve, Stanton. The F.B.I. have some of the most highly-trained investigators in the business. Do you know why they hire guys like me? So they don’t end up taking any heat if something goes wrong. There’s nothing on paper shows they ever met me, and they’ll damn sure deny it now.”
“Do you mean to tell me–”
“I mean to tell you the feds want Giarelli. They don’t give that,” I snapped my fingers in the air, “for one more Wall Street investor type. Much less some Kansas City gumshoe. We’re on our own here.”
After a long moment, Stanton asked uncert
ainly: “What should we do?”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” I told him. “Out there in that living room is four hundred thousand dollars cash. Two hundred of it yours that you brought over the other night, two hundred of it mine that we just delivered.
“Four hundred grand,” I continued. “Maybe a dozen feet away from us. And only one locked door and one man keeping us from getting that money and getting the hell out of town. At least that’s what I plan to do if we get out of this room, and I’d strongly suggest you do the same.”
“You haven’t forgotten that this one man is an armed and violent criminal?”
“He’s still only one man. I have an idea, but I’m going to need your help.”
Stanton waffled. “I’m not sure…”
“It’s a risk, Stanton, yes. But a risk means a chance. What do you think your chances are if you wait till Giarelli and more armed men come back here? After they’ve just put a bullet in a federal agent and probably Ryland as well? And they know we know about it?”
Stanton considered for a scant few seconds.
“What is your plan, Mr. Caine?”
I explained it to him, gave him a few minutes to prepare himself, then waited while Stanton walked up and rapped sharply on the locked door. He waited a moment then looked at me. I nodded and he rapped again.
“What is it?” The gruff voice coming through the door sounded groggy, like the man had been dozing in a chair.
“I…I need to use the lavatory,” Stanton explained.
“Hold it.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t. I’m afraid…this is such a nice room and I…”
“Jesus Christ,” came the voice. “Hang on.” The key turned in the lock and the door opened a few inches as the man peeked inside. He stepped back and quickly pulled the door open wide, his gun sweeping the room.
“You,” he said to me, “get back away from the door. Over there in the corner.” He gestured with his gun for Stanton to come outside, then closed and relocked the bedroom door. I heard him escorting Stanton to the bathroom amid muffled threats.
About forty seconds later I was knocking on the bathroom door.
“You can come out now.”
Stanton stepped out, a little shaken, his eyes fixing on the unconscious form of the guard on the floor.
“How did you–”
“Picked the lock and sneaked up on him while he was watching the bathroom door. Knocked him out with an ashtray.”
Stanton blinked at me.
“Wasn’t that dangerous?”
“Hell yes, it was dangerous,” I answered, irritated by the stupid question. “Come on, we haven’t got much time.”
I tore the sash off the curtains and tied up the unconscious gangster, then helped Stanton look for the money. It was gone, both the valise Stanton had delivered a few nights ago and the satchel we’d brought with us. I grabbed my wire recorder and we high-tailed it down the stairs to my suite two floors below, where we braced ourselves with a libation from the liquor cart.
Stanton stood there with his whiskey, watching me as I pulled my last two cashier’s checks out of the drawer of the escritoire and looked them over.
“Mr. Caine, I want my thirty thousand dollars back.”
“What?”
“The money you loaned me wasn’t yours. You’ve admitted that.”
“The money was in my possession when I handed it over,” I protested.
“Come now,” Stanton said, the corners of his mouth turned down in disapproval. “You were given this money from the federal government to help them build a case against Mr. Giarelli. You can hardly qualify passing it over to me as a loan from you personally.”
“I can and I am. Now beat it, Stanton, I have things to do.”
“You’re leaving town?”
I walked over to the fireplace and picked up a poker, weighing it in my hands. I took out my cigarette lighter and tested the flame a couple of times.
“Not now,” I answered. “First I’m going upstairs and have a talk with that man I tied up.”
“Whatever for?”
“I need to find out where Giarelli took Ryland and that fed.”
Stanton finished his drink.
“So you can report that information to the F.B.I.?”
“Stay close, Stanton,” I said, glancing at the cashier’s checks on the escritoire. “I may need your help and I can still make it worth your while.”
“You suggested upstairs that I leave town.”
“That was before I knew Giarelli took our money with him. I wouldn’t leave town just yet, not if you want your money back.”
“The federal authorities can’t assist you with this?” he asked.
“I told you, Stanton, I’ve got things to do just now.”
I walked out of the suite, poker in hand, no longer worried about Stanton.
After a brief but productive chat with the torpedo in Giarelli’s suite, I knew I had time to stop by my first hotel. My real identification and my gun were there, and I might need both. I opened the door to my room to find the lights on and Straker sitting next to the window, Volnick and Sanderson flanking him. Penny Sills was sitting in a chair several feet away, her hands folded meekly in her lap. Christ, but I was getting tired of people using my rooms!
I stepped inside and closed the door behind me.
“What the hell are you doing here, Straker?” His suit jacket and hat were hanging neatly on the back of the bathroom door. He sat there in his vest and tie, smoothing the cuffs of his shirt.
“Thought you were going to keep me informed, Dev.” Straker licked his thumb and polished one cufflink. “I know I asked you to. I know you said you would.”
“I’m stringing Stanton, playing the mark for him. Trying to help you and the feds nail him. You know all that already.”
“Yeah, I do,” he said. “What I don’t know about, what I need to know more about, is one of your operatives impersonating a federal agent from the U.S. Treasury. And over four hundred thousand dollars in phony cashier’s checks. And fifty dollars in silver from a bank in Delaware.”
I looked over at Penny, who was staring down at her lap.
“What I especially need to know more about,” Straker continued in his oily, over-confident way, “is this.” He pulled a case out from under the chair he was sitting in. It was a wire recorder, similar to the one I’d been using. Straker worked the controls and two voices came out of the speaker: mine and Nathan’s. I closed my eyes for a second. We didn’t use names and we didn’t say the word “embezzlement,” but it was definitely a conversation that would warrant further interest from any number of people.
“The house phone downstairs,” I said simply.
“Wire-tap.” The word came out through Straker’s smug smile. This was bad, all right, but I had to get to Jennings before I could worry about anything else.
“I’m in the middle of something,” I said. “Let’s meet up tomorrow and I’ll fill you in.”
Straker shook his head, laughing.
“Same old Dev,” he said. “Thinks he’s smarter than just about everyone else. You give him a fair shake and he knifes you in the back.”
“Now, Straker,” I smiled gently, “that’s just not fair. I’ve always come at you from the front.”
“You greedy, stuck-up bastard!” Straker spat. “Pinkerton’s wasn’t good enough for you. Working for J. Edgar By God Hoover isn’t good enough for you. Always figure you can do better for yourself working your own angle. Too good to take help from anyone else. Too smart to listen to anyone else.”
“Sorry, Straker, I don’t have the time.” I grabbed my identification and my gun from the bureau, then turned to Penny. “Come on, we’re leaving.”
“She’s staying here, Caine,” Straker explained. “She’s going to answer some more questions if she doesn’t want to be locked up on charges.”
“She’s going with me, Straker. She’s going now. Try and stop us, you’l
l end up eating through a tube in your stomach this time.”
“There are three of us,” Straker reminded me.
“In this room?” I said. “There are five of us, all told. And four of us don’t like you very much.”
The flash of doubt in Straker’s eyes was good enough; he knew better than to push it.
“Caine,” he shook his head and laughed again, grinning smugly as idiots do when they think they know something. “What are you up to? You think you’re going to take on a confidence man and get away with it? Stay one step ahead of the F.B.I. and play them for suckers? Outwit some mobster and live to tell the tale? You think you’re going to do all this, take on all these different people, and just walk away when you’re done with a pile of money?”
What bothered me more than Straker’s tone, what was unforgivable, in fact, was that he was right. He hadn’t said anything I hadn’t been accusing myself of all along. One man who wasn’t a professional confidence man, who wasn’t backed up by the authority of the federal government, who could only rely on maybe a handful of other people – and most of them no better connected. I was being a fool and knew it.
But somehow, hearing all that come out in Straker’s heavily patronizing tone, seeing that goddamned, undeserved superior smile on his face, infuriated me enough to throw every one of my switches in reverse. All my nagging doubts disappeared in that moment, to be replaced by the kind of confident resolve I’ve rarely felt in my life.
I walked over to Penny, took her by the arm, and fixed Straker with a cold smile.
“Watch me.”
Penny and I walked down the street to my parked car.
“How did Straker find you?” I asked.
“I guess he’s been tailing us,” she said. “Saw us together a couple of times. He and those guys came over to my apartment and he started demanding to know all kinds of stuff. Made all kinds of threats. Said he was going to have me arrested for obstructing justice and withholding evidence and whatever else he could think of.” She stopped for a moment, scowling. “That weaselly son of a bitch even accused me of being a streetwalker.”
“Ah, hell, kid, don’t let that get to you. Straker wouldn’t know what to do with a streetwalker if someone gave him written instructions and a training film.” That made her laugh, for a moment, anyway. She looked up at me with concern.
A Shared Confidence Page 31