by Harry Hoge
He finally managed to fall into a limbo of near sleep, and was washing to and fro in unreal thought when she pulled back the blanket and snuggled in beside him. She didn't say anything and neither did he. He inhaled her aroma as he stroked her hair and rubbed her back gently. Soon they were both sleeping soundly like puppies in a basket they had nearly outgrown.
Pauley arose first, and was dressed and gone before Frank sat up from the couch and contemplated how he would approach Reuben Rankin. He showered and dressed. Pauley had brought the morning paper in from the stoop and left it for him on the breakfast table. Below the fold, under bold headlines, was the story of the clown case, only a three-inch column with few facts and no continuation or side bar. His name wasn't mentioned. It hadn't come from Lieutenant Barker's office. Probably the girl at Nguyen's apartment complex.
He drank orange juice and grabbed a bagel and a cup of coffee in a roadie-mug before heading out the door. He took I-10 to the 610 loop and turned south. When he reached San Felipe, he went east to Willowick and turned left. He had little trouble finding the estate on Del Monte. A lane covered with white gravel and lined with azalea bushes in their forlorn winter guise led him under overhanging branches of gigantic live oak trees to a curving driveway. The house had the massive white columns and red brick of Jeffersonian styling. He left the blue and white in the middle of the drive and strolled to the door, taking in the immaculate rolling lawn and showy topiary shrubs. Reuben had a coin or two.
He rang the doorbell, expecting a servant to come and ask him why he thought he should be in this neighborhood and where he got the audacity to expect to see the master without an engraved invitation. Instead, a friendly voice chirped over an intercom.
"Detective Rivers. What a pleasant surprise. Come on in."
Frank glanced around for the camera system, but he couldn't see it.
"When you hear the click," the voice continued, "the door is unlocked and the security system is disarmed. Come in and close the door behind you, then walk straight ahead until you see a stairway going down. I'm in the workout room at the bottom of those stairs. Come on down."
Frank heard the click, then tried the door and it opened. He stepped into a foyer floored with white marble. The walls were flat white and brass hurricane lamps lit his way. The marble gave way to hardwood that would have put Madison Square Garden's basketball court to shame. The wood ran by a wide staircase leading up. There was a mechanized seat along the banister, intended, Frank surmised, to get Rankin upstairs unassisted.
The hall was covered with wall hangings. They were all poster-sized portraits of Reuben Rankin on stage in various costumes and makeup. In every one, he was holding a microphone and brandishing a broad, captivating smile.
There was a wheelchair at the top of the stairs that led down, and a second mechanized glide-seat rail. The seat was at the foot of the stairway. Frank heard muffled voices and what sounded like the clank of a barbell being seated on the holder over a weight-lifting bench. He descended the stairs and saw Rankin sitting on the workbench, wiping his face with a huge white terrycloth towel. There was another wheelchair near the bench.
Rankin's apparent fitness was a surprise. His face still reminded Frank of the Pillsbury Doughboy, but the muscle tone of his chest and arms were that of an athlete. His legs however, were spindly and sinewy.
Frank scanned the room, finding it more than just a gym. There was a home theater on the right, with an enormous LCD viewing screen and four plush chairs. A closed louvered metal door covered the wall directly behind the workout area. On the left was a fully stocked wet bar. The bodyguard with the pigtail sat on a stool at the bar, sipping a glass of amber colored liquid and staring at Frank. Two brawny Boxer dogs made bookends on either side of the bar stool, staring at Frank with the same intensity as the bodyguard. Both dogs sat like statues, their cropped ears up and forward. The one on the right rose to all fours. The entire rear quarters of the dog wagged, not only the tail, and the animal whined. Rankin glanced at the dogs.
"Senta!" The dog sat immediately, and both Boxers planed their ears and looked sad. "Don't worry. They're both sissies," Rankin said, "but I don't want that to get out. They're meant to be vicious guard dogs." He turned to face Frank. "Welcome to my home, Detective Rivers. After...ahem...running into you yesterday, I hoped you would come."
"Why did you expect me, Mr. Rankin? I didn't know who you were until after we met."
Rankin didn't answer immediately. He nodded to the man at the bar. "Gus, come help me up."
Gus sauntered to the wheelchair and picked up a fluffy white robe. He held it, and helped Rankin put it on and stand. Rankin smoothed the robe, uncovering the logo on the left breast, two large letter R’s in midnight black. When Rankin nodded, Gus lifted him with ease into the wheelchair. Rankin touched a lever on the right arm of the chair and swung around to face Frank.
"I know all about you, Detective Rivers. One of my passions is reading about police work. I confess, your name has become more than familiar to me. Like a voyeur or a stalker, I've followed your career in detail. When I saw you at the Ha Ha House yesterday, I concluded you were there at that time of day for only one reason—some sort of investigation." The congenial smile that hadn't left his face since he began talking to Frank broadened. "Am I correct?"
"Is your club investigated often?"
Rankin clapped his hands. "Excellent. You don't disappoint, answering a question with a question. No, glad to say, I don't think any of my clubs have ever been investigated." Frank started to say something, but Rankin held up his hand. "Wait," he said. "This isn't the best way to have a civil conversation. Let's go to the den. Would you like a drink?"
Frank refused the drink and stood back as Rankin propelled his chair to the stairway. He lifted himself with grace born from practice onto the glide seat, and began to ride up the stairs.
"Neat, huh?" Rankin exclaimed. "What a wonderful way to climb stairs, Detective. You should try it."
Frank walked along beside, aware that Gus was busy tidying up the workout area. The dogs bound up the stairs, passing Frank, and waited, wiggling and whining as Rankin maneuvered himself into the waiting wheelchair.
"This way," Rankin said, and zipped off to a room under the main staircase. The dogs' toenails clicked on the hardwood floor in rhythm. Frank decided that Reuben Rankin was a contented man, his mood reflected in his eyes, snappy dark eyes that sparkled with humor.
The room looked more like a library than a den. Book shelves filled two walls, and framed pictures of Rankin posing with various celebrities covered the others. Frank recognized faces of people he had seen on TV and in the movies: Dean Martin, Johnny Carson, Steve Martin and Joan Rivers caught his eye.
The dogs found a carpet in the corner and curled up with heads on paws. Evidence of a habit developed by frequent visits to the room.
There was a drafting table and a long library-like table in the middle of the room, and two overstuffed chairs nearby. Frank walked to the bookshelves and began reading titles. There were numerous subjects and many covers that he assumed to be first editions. One entire section was reserved for police procedural and private detective novels written by modern writers: Michael Connelly, Patricia Cromwell, James Lee Burke, Sara Paretsky, Jeffery Deaver and Janet Evanovich to name but a few. Shelved with the novels were books on poisons and weapons and procedures used by many police departments.
"Do you like my collection, Detective?"
"Impressive. I've heard of many of these authors, but I must confess, I haven't read any of them."
"Ah, yes. That would be a true busman's holiday, I would imagine."
Frank didn't respond. His attention had fallen on three thick binders, too tall for the space, lying flat on the bottom shelf, spines outward, making the bold black titles easy to read - FRANK RIVERS, HPD.
"Drat," Rankin exclaimed when he saw Frank's astonishment. "You've discovered my secret before I could show it to you." He wheeled to the bookcase and too
k the top folder down. "I'm a real fan. A groupie I fear. I've followed your career through the press and scrounged up what I could from other sources. It was quite sad when you were forced to expose your long-term partner last year."
"I don't know whether to be flattered or alarmed," Frank replied.
"Don't worry," Rankin laughed. "I'm not a stalker, merely a fan. Fans are important people in my business."
"I've heard you were a headliner in Las Vegas. Do you still perform?"
The snappy eyes took on a forlorn aspect. "Alas, no. I tried a comeback once, but what with my handicap, and the way the restrictions encumbered my delivery, I couldn't pull it off. Look at this clipping." He had opened the binder to a photo that Frank recognized immediately. It was he, caught with his suit coat open to expose his revolver in a shoulder holster, the door of his car wide open behind him and the front door of the Houston City Hotel in front of him.
"Early in your career," Rankin commented.
"Very early. That was my arrival at..."
"Your friend, the attorney. No need to bring up names of the dead. I was impressed by how you wouldn't accept what everyone else thought was obvious, the lawyer found naked in a hotel room from an apparent overdose of narcotics. You not only found the killer, but you cleared your friend's good name. His family must have been most grateful."
"Have you seen the papers this morning, Mr. Rankin?"
The man looked up over the rim of the binder. "No, not yet. I usually do that with lunch. Gus always puts the morning papers on the table in the dining room. Is there something I should read?"
Frank removed the photo of Nguyen from his pocket and showed it to him. "There's a report of his murder on the front page."
He watched the humor drain from Rankin's eyes, replaced by a flinty hardness he couldn't interpret.
Rankin looked at his lap and mumbled. "So that's why you were at the club on Gray."
Frank nodded.
Rankin spun his chair and rolled to the middle of the room before wheeling back near one of the overstuffed chairs. Frank noticed Rankin's eyes were misty. He was fighting back tears.
"Sit down, Detective. You must have hundreds of questions to ask me." Frank sat.
"The first one is obvious, Mr. Rankin. When was the last time you saw Mr. Nguyen alive?"
Rankin took a moment to think. "Wednesday night. After the last show, Manny told me about his offer from Las Vegas. We sat alone at the club for hours, toasting his success and lamenting the separation."
"Were you happy for him?"
"Oh my, yes. The reason I decided to get into the comedy club business in the first place was to help propel talented comics along the path to the top. I realized that if I had to languish in a wheelchair the rest of my life, the least I could do was provide opportunity for others from my home town."
"I understand you arranged a going away party for him, and he didn't show."
"I wasn't surprised when he ducked the party. He didn't like that sort of thing. I did it anyway, as much for the others at the club as for him. Now I know why he didn't come. He was dead."
"This may be a delicate question, Mr. Rankin, but how did you lose the use of your legs?"
"The newspapers said that I was drunk and fell off the stage while I was performing, but that's a lie. I was shot. Low in the back. I tumbled into the pit and thought I was going to die. Maybe I did, in a way."
"I should be aware of all this, but I confess, I know nothing about the story."
"Not much to know, really. There has always been a...what shall I say, a gangland atmosphere in Vegas? Even more so in the early days than now. I wasn't popular with some of the club owners anyway, and when I got word to the proper authorities about some high dollar drug deals, one of them retired me."
"I see. That's interesting, but about Mr. Nguyen. You called him Manny."
Rankin laughed. "The man of many names. I thought his choice for a stage name, Hon Cu Loa, was a stroke of genius. Monkey's Island. Most of his co-workers tagged him 'Monkey,' but I knew him as Manny Wynne before he earned his name. He needed to appear as a recent emigrant from Viet Nam, so he resurrected Nguyen Qui Mang, the name on his birth certificate, as a cover in case the press dug into his background. He is... was very Americanized."
"Did he have any enemies?"
"Not that I know of. Everyone liked him. If he was murdered, it must have been by a scorned female or something to do with drugs."
"Did he have a drug problem?"
"I don't think so. Almost everyone in the entertainment business tries a little coke or some left-handed cigarettes on occasion, but he never went to extremes."
"Why did you suggest drugs?"
"Nothing else makes sense. Why would anyone want to kill a clown?"
"Is that common? To refer to comics as clowns?" Rankin nodded. "Been that way for a long time " Frank wanted to change the tempo of the interview He chose to put Rankin on the defensive. "I've heard you underpay your entertainers at the club," He exclaimed, "and insist on a kickback after they've become successful." If he expected Rankin to bristle, he was off base. Rankin laughed and slapped his knees.
"I know where that comes from. You've been talking to 'The Grinch,' Gretchen Sullivan, bartender at the Ha Ha House. She's always trying to make me out as a criminal. Anyone that knows the business realizes I have to pay scale at the very least, and I'd never sign a decent act if that was all I paid. As to the 'kickback,' I sign most of the stand-ups as their agent if they don't have one. All agents get a percent of their client's income."
"And Mars?" Frank found Rankin's laughter infectious. He couldn't keep himself from grinning.
"Oh yes, Marsha. Never a more naive young gal did I ever meet. Good for the soul, that one."
"I've noticed that all the people around your clubs have stage names. Is that common?"
"Almost required in show business. Remember, it's entertainment. Nothing is ever entirely what it seems."
Frank asked several more questions and Rankin answered forthright and in detail. He appeared to hold nothing back, nor did he seem to have anything to hide. When Frank closed his notebook and stuck his pencil in his pocket, Rankin reached out and clasped him on the forearm.
"You're a talented investigator, Detective Rivers. I have faith in you. Get this killer. Manny was my friend. Almost a son to me. Don't let the bastard get away."
Chapter 9
Frank stood on the porch of Reuben Rankin's house and pondered what he'd experienced during the visit. Nothing was as it appeared, Rankin had said about entertainers, and he was one of the best. He remained Frank's number one suspect in Nguyen's murder, but it was like catching buckshot with mosquito netting. It left his story full of holes.
He flipped open his cell phone and checked for messages. There was just one: Gerry. He rang her number.
"Hey, Frank. How'd the interview go with Rankin?"
"It was different, to say the least. I'm still trying to get it organized in my head. How's house hunting?"
"Perfect. I found exactly what I wanted on Fowler, about two blocks from Washington. Roger Harrington is helping me move. We should have the grunt work done by sundown, but it'll take me forever to get everything arranged the way I want it. Of course, I MUST go shopping for new things."
"If I can talk Pauley into it, I plan to take her out for dinner tonight."
"Sounds like a plan. I'll keep my phone on."
"Me too. I hope we don't get a call."
"I hear that. See you Monday."
Before he put the phone away, he called Pauley. She answered on the first ring.
"Hi, Cisco. Where are you?"
"Why, where would any debonair, wealthy bachelor be on a fair Sunday morning? I'm in River Oaks."
"It doesn't suit you, and it's afternoon, you ninny."
Frank looked at his watch. "Are you at the apartment?"
"Not yet. Should be there in about fifteen minutes."
"I've got one more thing I
need to do. I should be there in an hour or so. Tell you what. Let's get cleaned up and I'll take you out to dinner at a wonderful place where you've never been."
"Okay," she said, drawing the word out so it sounded more like a question. Frank knew she was dying to ask where he'd been without her. He didn't respond. Pauley answered after a pause, her voice still sounding more quizzical than confidant. "That sounds great. See you soon."
When Frank entered the library at Rice University, he grinned. The smell of the place brought back memories of previous visits. He loved libraries. Each had a distinct aroma, yet was unique unto itself. When he entered the front door of Rice's library, it had a sweet industrial smell from the cleaning fluids. When he pushed into the main area, the cleaning fluid smell at first mingled, then gave way to the aroma of varnish on fine wood and the powdery smell of old books.
He went directly to the computer catalog and found where the files for old newspapers about the entertainment industry were kept. He took a cubical and researched the rise and fall of Reuben Rankin's career. When he finished, it was a bigger puzzle than ever. Rankin hadn't lied when he said he'd been shot on stage, but what was most remarkable to Frank was the name of the shooter - Gus Sullivan. There was a photo of Sullivan. He hadn't worn his hair in a ponytail back then.
"Where in the world are you taking me? Aren't we going toward Tomball?" Pauley asked as Frank maneuvered off the Sam Houston Parkway and onto Cutten Road. They were driving Frank's Karman Ghia, the one he'd found after his old wheels from college, a car of similar vintage, had been demolished, putting Frank in the hospital. Frank enjoyed the sports car, but it didn't have the intrigue of the one he'd lost. His first car had teemed with fond memories. This car only reminded him of his loss. He wanted to trade up, get a new vehicle. Pauley had nagged him about buying a newer car before the wreck, but she now seemed to be enjoying this car, and he didn't know how she would react if he traded for a new one. His fear about losing her again was crippling his ability to think straight—a way to ensure the demise of the relationship.