W Is for Wasted

by Sue Grafton

  “Mr. Bryce?”

  He didn’t own up to it but he didn’t deny it, so I moved right along. I held up my clipboard. “I’m a former colleague of Pete Wolinsky’s.”

  Again, no verbal response but his complexion shifted, white patches appearing on a ground of pink. His mouth must have been dry because he licked his lips. I hoped the man wasn’t a serious poker player because I could see now he might be a textbook study in physiological tells. “You knew Pete was killed?”

  “I read about it in the papers. Too bad.”

  “Terrible,” I said. That out of the way, I went on. “His wife asked me to go through his business files for tax purposes and I came across his report. I wonder if you could answer some questions.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t help. I don’t have anything to say.”

  “But you were a client of his.”

  “Um, no. Not really. I mean, I knew him and we talked a couple of times, but that was it. More like friends.”

  Baffling, wasn’t it? I looked down at the paper on my clipboard and allowed that little crease to form between my eyes. “According to his records, he collected approximately . . . I can’t read his writing here. It looks like two thousand dollars, which you paid him to follow your wife . . .”

  He glanced over his shoulder and then eased out the door.

  I leaned sideways and peered over his shoulder. “Oh, wow. Is she home?”

  “No, she’s out. I don’t want to talk about this. My wife doesn’t know anything and I’d just as soon she not find out.”

  “Is she at work?”

  “She quit her job, if it’s any business of yours. She’s off at the supermarket. Look, I’ll tell you what I can, but you have to be gone by the time she gets back.”

  “Then we better be quick about it. In Reno, she met twice with a man named Owen Pensky. I gather he’s an old high school friend. Do you have any idea what they talked about?”

  Lines appeared on Willard’s forehead, and his upper lip lifted toward one side of his nose. “You said this was for tax purposes. I don’t understand the relevance.”

  “Don’t ask me. I can’t begin to guess why the IRS is looking into it.”

  “The IRS?”

  “This Pensky fellow might be the focus of their investigation. I really have no idea. Pete was obviously concerned enough to make a note of it.”

  “Well, yes. That was partly my doing. When she got back from Reno, she started shutting herself in the bedroom, making long-distance calls. When I told him about it, he thought there might be a problem.”

  “Good guess on his part,” I remarked. I looked at him without comment, creating a small stretch of silence.

  Willard shifted his weight. “So what happened was, he overheard a phone conversation between Mary Lee and Owen Pensky . . .”

  “How’d he manage that?”

  “What?”

  “How could Pete overhear a phone conversation? I’m not following.”

  He adjusted his crutches and stepped back. “I don’t think I should say anything more. Maybe someone else can help.”

  “Wait,” I said. “Hold on. I’m probably out of line here, Mr. Bryce, but in my past association with Pete, there were occasions when he employed a phone bug. Any chance of that here? Because if you gave your consent, you may be facing a serious legal issue.”

  “I didn’t consent. I was against it. I didn’t like the idea at all, but he said if there was something going on, we might as well know the truth.”

  “So you’re saying he recorded a private conversation.”

  “He might have without me knowing it.”

  “You didn’t hear the tape yourself?”

  “No way. I paid him and that’s the last I saw of him.”

  “What happened to the tape?”

  “He kept it, I guess . . . if there was one.”

  “I got that already. ‘If there was one,’ where is it?”

  “He didn’t say anything more about it.”

  “He dropped the matter?” I said, my tone incredulous.

  “Yes.”

  “He let it go and that was the end of it? You’re talking about Pete Wolinsky, is that correct? Because I can promise you Pete never let anything go if there was money to be made.”

  “Well, there was this other idea he had. He thought she might have something at work. You know . . . like in her desk—letters or something—so he came up with this plan to go into the lab using her employee badge, which I was supposed to give him.”

  This was unexpected. I studied him with interest. “Really. When was this?”

  “August 24, but she turned in her notice that day, so all of a sudden it wasn’t any big deal. She quit and that was the end of it. I don’t think she’s talked to Pensky since.”

  I said, “Ah.”

  “I was sick of the whole thing by then anyway. I figured Pete was feeding me a line of bull and I got tired of playing along.”

  “What was your last contact with him?”

  “The next morning. I guess he slept in his car all night because the minute Mary Lee went off to work, he was knocking at my door, all rude and aggressive about why hadn’t I handed over her ID. I fired him right then.”

  “And that night he was shot to death.”

  Willard lifted a hand in protest. “Oh, no. No, no. It wasn’t that night, was it?”

  “The twenty-fifth.”

  “No connection there. None whatsoever.”

  I stared. “I want to talk to your wife.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  “She and Owen Pensky had a subject under discussion and she’s the only one who knows what it was. Well, no, that’s not quite true. Pensky knew, of course. And Pete knew, didn’t he?”

  “How would I know what Pete knew? Now get away from here. I don’t have to talk to you. I only did this to be nice. You have no reason to bother my wife. You want to know what they talked about, call Pensky and ask him.”

  “Good idea. I may do that, but I should warn you, if I don’t get answers from him, I’ll be talking to her.”

  “No. Absolutely not.”

  “I don’t need your permission, Mr. Bryce, so if there’s anything you want to ’fess up to, I’d suggest you do it soon.”

  I took out a business card, slid it into his shirt pocket, and gave it a pat.

  • • •

  I drove home in a state of suspended animation. I was sorry to learn Mary Lee had quit her job, because she’d no longer have access to sensitive information. By the same token, maybe now that she was free as a bird, she’d be happy to blow the whistle on Reed. If Pete had overheard a discussion about the trial or the patients Reed had lost, it would have put him in the perfect position to collect.

  At my desk again, I pulled Pete’s cardboard box into view and removed the lid. His tape recorder was still wedged in at one end where I remembered last seeing it. I removed it from the box and set it on the desk in front of me. I flipped open the lid and checked the cassette he’d left in place. I could see the bulk of the tape had progressed from the left spindle to the right side of the cassette. I pressed rewind and watched the spindles go round and round until they came to a stop.

  I closed my eyes briefly, wondering if there were truly angels up in heaven. Only one way to find out . . .

  I pressed play.

  The first conversation I picked up was clearly unrelated to my interests. It dawned on me, too late of course, that I should have made a note of where the tape was before I’d so blithely run it back. I played and stopped my way through fifty minutes of other people’s business, some of which was downright embarrassing. Finally, I heard a woman’s voice and a phrase or two that made my ears perk up. Again, I had to back-and-forth until I caught the beginning of the segment.

  The sound quality was decent, but the recorder had picked up only half the conversation. A woman, sounding harried, said, “It’s me. I don’t have much time, so let’s make this quick. What
’s happening on your end?”

  Having never heard Mary Lee Bryce’s voice, I had no idea if I was hearing it now.

  Her phonemate said something that the recorder didn’t pick up. Then she said, “Not yet. I know where they are. I just can’t get to them. I’m trying to track the one guy down but it’s tough. Can’t you use the information I already gave you?”

  I heard nothing while the person she was talking to said a few words. I didn’t even know if it was a woman or a man. Guess it could have been a dog. Arf, arf.

  “Owen, I know that! How do you think I spotted it in the first place? The pattern’s there. What I don’t have is proof. Meantime, I’m walking on eggshells . . .”

  Ah, Owen Pensky and Mary Lee Bryce. How lovely to have you here. Carry on.

  She said, “I hope not. You don’t understand how ruthless he is. It’s fine as long as I’m in the lab, but I can’t get anywhere near the clinic.”

  A question from Owen.

  Her reply: “The lab’s in Southwick. The clinic’s in the Health Sciences Building.”

  I stopped the tape and scribbled as much as I remembered. I pressed play again. This was like a two-character radio drama. Mary Lee to Owen, Owen to Mary Lee, except that his comments were a blank. She might have been talking to herself.

  “Because that’s where the subjects are seen for follow-up.”

  Whatever Owen said in answer was met with derision: “Oh, right,” said she. “Talk about a red flag.”

  And a moment later, “I figured you’d appreciate the finer points.”

  There was an exchange about a journal published in Germany.

  I listened, squinting, but couldn’t see the relevance, so I moved past that bit and concentrated on the next.

  Mary Lee said, “‘Too bad’ is right. What he’s doing here is worse. With the grant he got, he can’t afford to fail.”

  Silence.

  “Nuhn-uhn. He has no clue I’m onto him. Otherwise, he’d have found a way to get rid of me before now. I mentioned his ripping me off because it’s indicative of his . . .”

  I stopped the tape again and wrote down what I’d heard. My Aunt Gin had refused to let me take secretarial courses in high school and I was royally pissed off about it now. If I’d been able to take shorthand, I could have made quick work of this. I pressed play again. I missed a garbled sentence or two, but I could have sworn she’d mentioned Glucotace.

  “I have his password, but that’s it so far.”

  Owen responded, silently.

  “It was written on a piece of paper in his desk drawer. How’s that for clever?”

  Again, a pause for her response.

  “Because I saw the printout before he shredded it.”

  I pressed stop and play until I heard her say, “Not Stupak’s, Linton’s. These guys are always circling the wagons. Any hint of trouble, they close ranks. Shit. Gotta go. Bye.”

  I could see how the deal had gone down. Pete had persuaded Willard to plant a pen mike and this is what it had netted him. If the call had been recorded with a phone bug, both sides of the conversation would have been audible. As for the content, he must have recognized the value of what he’d heard. Given the way his mind worked, how could he not? That’s when he must have done his homework, picking up background on Linton Reed and information on Glucotace. I assumed he set up an appointment with Reed afterward so the two could have a cozy heart-to-heart talk.

  What I couldn’t see was where I might go with this. Linton Reed was wily. He was a cool customer and all he had to do was sit tight. Whatever he’d been up to at work, he was never going to be caught out. If Pete was onto him and had hit him up for money, how would the facts come to light? Pete was dead. The tape would never be admissible in a court of law. Now what?

  33

  Late Friday afternoon, my curiosity finally got the better of me. I drove to Colgate and parked outside the apartment complex where Willard and Mary Lee lived. I knocked, this time hoping to catch her at home instead of him. She opened the door and regarded me briefly without saying a word.

  She was small. Her face was a perfect oval, her features fine. Her red hair was straight, chin-length and cut jaggedly. Her forehead was high. A fine haze of red freckles gave her complexion a ruddy hue. Pale brows, blue eyes with no visible lashes. Very red lips. She was a slip of a thing, so delicately built that it made her feet look too big for her slender frame. “You’re the private detective who was here.”

  “Yes.”

  Her smile was pained. “You’ll be happy to know Willard told me everything. Full confession.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I had no guarantee he’d actually told her the whole truth and nothing but the truth so I was reluctant to interject a comment. “Can I have a few minutes of your time?”

  “Why not? I’m leaving, so it’s lucky you caught me when you did. We can talk while I pack.”

  I followed her into the apartment. Willard was clearly somewhere else so I didn’t bother asking about him. She proceeded to the bedroom, which was small and painted white. The bed was neatly made and a big soft-sided suitcase was sitting open on the spread. This was a room where the couple didn’t seem to spend much time. Tidy, but no books. No easy chair, no reading lamp, and no photographs. The closet doors were open, and I could see that the space had been divided democratically: a quarter for him, three quarters for her.

  I took a position at the foot of the bed while she resumed her packing. She removed a pair of slacks from a hanger and folded them neatly before she placed them in the right half of the open suitcase. She had a packet of tissue paper on the bed, and she’d stuffed a sheet into the toe of each shoe before she tucked the pair in along the sides. She’d already packed underwear and sweaters.

  I said, “Where will you go?”

  “A motel for the next few days. After that, I don’t know.”

  “Did Willard explain why I was here?”

  “Because you’re a friend of the detective he hired.”

  “Not a friend. He was someone I’d worked with in the past.”

  “He sure had Willard wrapped around his little finger. I still can’t believe he hired a guy to follow me. What was going on in his head?”

  “I guess he was feeling insecure.”

  “He’s an idiot. I wish I’d realized it earlier.”

  “He told me you quit your job.”

  “That’s a move I’ll live to regret,” she said. “Jobs are scarce. I’ve been putting out résumés for two months and getting no response. From now on I’ll mind my own business, assuming I ever work again.”

  She returned to the closet, picked two hangers off the rod, and returned to the bed. She removed a dress from each of the hangers and folded them, using tissue paper to minimize wrinkling.

  “Pete taped a telephone conversation between you and Owen Pensky.”

  “That’s nice. Did he plant cameras in the apartment so he could watch my every move?”

  “He probably would have if he thought he could get away with it.”

  She moved to the chest of drawers behind me and checked the first and second drawers. The first was empty. From the second drawer she removed a stack of neatly folded T-shirts that she placed in the left side of her suitcase. “Why are you so interested?”

  “I’m distantly related to Terrence Dace.”

  She fixed a look on me. “I’m sorry. I forget sometimes that life is about more than just me.”

  “Do you believe Dr. Reed was responsible for what happened to Terrence?”

  “Are you asking if I believe it or if I can prove it?”

  “Either one.”

  “I don’t think Dr. Reed’s responsible in the same way a drunk driver’s responsible in a hit-and-run fatality. All he was doing was protecting his own interests. Terrence Dace was collateral damage.”

  “You know he stole three medical charts. His own, Charles Farmer’s, and Sebastian Glenn’s,” I said.

  “I wasn’t awar
e of it, but good for him. Sebastian Glenn was the first death. Linton thought it was a fluke.”

  “But it wasn’t.”

  “One is a fluke. Three is a pattern.”

  “Did they have something in common? A condition or a disease that put them at risk?”

  “It’s possible they had health issues. Prediabetic or undiagnosed diabetes. Heart problems. I really have no idea. Most patients did fine on Glucotace. I had no access to the medical clinic where they were seen. I worked in the same lab with Linton, but not on the clinical trials he ran.”

  “You told Owen Pensky that Dr. Reed shredded something. I’m not sure what it was. I only heard your half of the conversation.”

  “Raw data. The printout was sitting on his desk. I caught a glimpse of the graph he’d done, which was a duplicate of one he’d used in an earlier trial. How stupid is that? You’d think if he was going to cheat, he’d be more imaginative.”

  “So he was, what, misrepresenting his results?”

  “It’s called trimming. If any values were too far out of line, he made adjustments.”

  “Did you report it to anyone above him in the chain of command?”

  “I couldn’t see the point. The director of the grants program is the one who hired him in the first place. He thinks Linton is a star, especially since he’s bringing money in.”

  “Actually, I talked to Dr. Reed yesterday.”

  “And how did he strike you? Is he a buffoon?”

  “No.”

  “Did he sweat? Did his hands shake? Did he hesitate?”

  “Once. At the end of our conversation.”

  “Well, trust me. He was either doing it for effect or trying to figure out an angle before he opened his mouth.”

  “When we shook hands at the end of the interview, his were like ice.”

  Her brows went up. “What the hell did you say to him?”

  “I was asking questions about Dace. I thought he was being candid. He didn’t seem tense or guarded. I know he was bullshitting on one point, but it was minor and I didn’t want to press.”

  She laughed. “That’s our boy. Mr. Slick. I’m surprised you picked up on it.”