"It implies," he said slowly, crushing the stub of his panatela in his overflowing ashtray, "that we are also stuck with the baggage of the past. There's lots out there who want to think we're incompetent, a label far more politically damaging than merely showing lesser homicide numbers." He lit another panatela. "We mustn't stand in the way of identifying the lady. That certainly counts as official interest. If you get my drift." Then he turned away, his attention now concentrad on some paperwork on his desk.
As she and Cates left, she felt his gaze on her back. Perhaps he was smiling as well. But she dared not turn back to find out.
———— *8* THE LAB confirmed the identity of Betty Taylor through her dental work. She was sure it would. Indeed, she was certain that the eggplant knew it would as well. Considering the quid pro quo of the transaction, she assumed that, if she postponed telling him, her permission to pursue the case further was automatically extended.
"Madness," Cates said, as she attempted to explain it.
"Not when you understand the code," she told him.
It was enough to motivate him into a frenzy of investigatory activity. Once committed, he was a tiger at footwork and a whiz at details. He went off to the Hill to speak to the staff director of the committee that had employed Betty Taylor, while she called the District Building to track down the owners of the building in which the young woman had lived.
She was shifted through a tangle of bureaucratic ineptitude, from one bored clerk to another, none of whom were intimidated by her official position.
"All I want to know is who owned the building in the late seventies."
"I got to check the tax records."
"Isn't there a simple list of property owners?"
"There's a problem with the computer stuff for that period. We gotta find it by hand."
"How long will that take?"
"It's nearly four."
"So?"
"So I'm off at four."
"You sound like you're off now," Fiona snapped.
"You want me to get your answer or not?"
"Do you realize you're obstructing justice?" Fiona said. It was the kind of question that telescoped its response.
"Kiss my ass."
"The way you move it that ought to take a week."
Round and round. She hung up in disgust, but with a greater understanding of the eggplant's fear of being labeled incompetent.
Then she got a call from Monte Pappas.
"What are you doing?" he asked. Although it had the air of flippancy, she could sense the tightness under the forced levity.
"If you were giving the bureaucracy an enema where would you put the nozzle?"
"Can I substitute a person and keep the water going until he explodes?"
"My answer was the District Government. What's yours?"
Suddenly, all happy-talk pretense evaporated.
"Fi, I've got to see you."
"Nice to be needed."
She retained a lightness, hoping that it had another connotation. But she knew better.
"More than you think," he said. "Urgently."
"When?"
"As fast as you can, Fi. Can I pick you up in fifteen minutes?"
"That bad?"
She looked at the notes on her yellow pad, contemplated the frustrations ahead of h er, regretting now that she had put the wheels in motion.
"You know where headquarters is. I'll be in front."
* * * SHE WAS prompt, but he was already there, his Caddy glistening from the rain. She had barely opened her umbrella before she had to close it again. He had swung the door open and she had hopped in.
The rain had turned nasty again, vast sheets angling against the windshield, winning the battle against the wipers. The grey skies were darkening into night.
"Hope you got your ark ready, Monte," Fiona quipped. His mood was gloomy, but he managed a polite grunt of acknowledgment. He made a sharp turn into the tunnel heading for Capitol Hill.
"I appreciate this, Fiona," he muttered. In profile he seemed to be biting his lower lip.
"What are friends for?" she said, hoping that the light touch wasn't off-putting. It didn't matter. He seemed to be ignoring it, lost in his own thoughts. She let him brood. Finally he spoke.
"I don't know how to handle this, Fi," Monte said. He took one hand off the steering wheel and gripped her arm. "It's your expertise."
"So far it's an endless prologue," she said.
"There's something else." Heleared his throat. "I need your word on this. Complete silence. No one."
She thought about that for a moment and searched for a way to say it.
"I render unto Caesar."
He nodded as if he understood. Then he seemed to be mulling it. "Fair enough," he said. He rubbed the back of his hand against his mouth.
"She's disappeared," he said, shaking his head. They were out of the tunnel and into the rain again, heading in the direction of the Capitol dome, lit now, a welcoming beacon in the downpour.
"Who?"
"Helga Kessel, wife of the Austrian Ambassador."
"The beautiful Helga, mistress of Senator Love."
Again, he ignored the attempt at a lighter touch. And yet, the subject matter belied his obvious panic.
"Who needed this?" He shook his head. She had turned to watch him and he had met her gaze briefly. A headlight illuminated his troubled eyes. "It was supposed to be all handled. Sam had taken the pledge. Clear sailing. Then this."
"There's missing and missing," Fiona said.
"I know." He expelled air through his teeth. "It's bizarre. He … Sam … gets this call no more than two hours ago. The Ambassador himself, Hans Kessel. Remember him?" She nodded. "Says they should meet at the Dupont Circle subway stop. Something urgent. Sam, naturally, calls Bunkie, who follows him."
"Not you?"
"I come later. I'm the fireman, you see. When I get to it, it's already a conflagration." He sucked air through his teeth. "Assholes."
"So they meet," Fiona prompted. He was obviously too upset to focus
logically. The explanation seemed painful.
"A brief talk. Kessel is panicked. The lady has vanished. As near as he can see no clothes missing. No notes. Nothing. She had gone out yesterday. He wasn't sure where. He let it go by one night. Maybe he's had some experience along these lines. When nearly another day went by, he got the message."
"Why Sam?"
"He knew. The son-of-a-bitch knew that Sam was diddling his wife."
"Was he hostile?"
"No. Nor irate. He's a European, if that explains it. He and Sam have a common cause." He turned toward her. "Not what you think," Monte sighed. "A morbid fear of embarrassment. He's also a diddler with political ambitions back in Austria. Takes one to know one."
"Did he have any ideas where the woman might have gone?"
"None. That's the point. He asked Sam that very same question."
"So what's the bottom line?" Fiona asked, her mind spinning with scenarios. Maybe the woman was teasing both of them, scaring the shit out of both of them, getting even. Fiona could empathize with that.
"You're the bottom line, Fi," Monte said.
The car sped through the rain, turned and proceeded on Independence Avenue.
"We're all way out of our depth. To report this thing could spell political sudden death for Sam and Kessel. It will come out. That's a given. Unless we can find some way to keep the lid on." He looked again toward Fiona. He slapped his chest. "We don't know how it's done."
"You think I do?"
"You're a cop. She's a missing person, for crying out loud."
"Could be just a game's she's playing."
"Some game."
"She got dumped. She was pissed off. Could be her way to twist your you-know-whats."
"We wish," Monte sighed. "That kind of pain we can live with." He grew silent. "But for how long?"
"Longer the better."
"Okay, she was dumped. But this is beyond th
e pale."
"No it's not."
She tried to soak up the woman's humiliation, calculate the anger and thirst for vengeance. Unfortunately, she could not sustain the indignation. The woman was a damned fool to get mixed up with a married politician. Served her right. The sense of sisterhood faded. Helga was a diplomat's wife, for chrissakes, she knew the score.
"How was it done?" she asked. "The Dear-John?"
Suddenly Monte slapped his thigh. The noise startled her.
"A comedy of errors, Fi. Wronll around. Bunkie Farrington was the messenger. I swear the morons are in charge. It was decided." He took his hands off the wheel to use them for emphasis. "I am equally at fault, knowing Sam's penchant for avoiding scenes. A sycophant panders, Fi. And it was I who said those immortal words: No more. Cut it clean, said Bunkie. He had done it before. He said he was good at it. It was the one time Sam should have done it himself."
"Real class," Fi said, disgusted.
"I think I could have stopped it. Now I pay. You are my ace card. No. My only card."
He pulled up in front of a townhouse. A man in a raincoat and hat sprung out of the shadows. She heard the click of car locks and the man came in the back door of the car.
"You remember Bunkie, Fi," Monte said. Fi turned and Bunkie grunted a response.
"Not my idea," he mumbled.
"Bunkie is hostile, Fi," Monte said.
"It grows," Bunkie said. "In this town, knowledge expands
geometrically."
Monte drove toward the Potomac, ducked under the highway, then found a parking space on Main Avenue. The rain had thinned out the tourist traffic and the dinner crowd had not yet begun to descend on the wall- to-wall restaurants along the river. They sat in the car, motor running, the rain pelting the roof and windshield.
"We're all going to drown anyway," Bunkie said gloomily.
"It was Bunkie here who was the last of our group to see the lady."
"No big deal. We met for cocktails at the Ritz-Carlton. She was already primed. I merely read her the drill. She said she understood."
"She wasn't upset that the Senator wasn't there to convey the sad news?"
"She said she wished it would have gone that way, but that she understood. This is no kid. She's in the game. I told her the Senator was running for President, for crying out loud. She was a liability and she knew it. I told her the Senator was broken up about it, but had to make this decision. Went smooth as silk. She was cool."
"Just like that. No emotion?" Fiona asked.
"She's a diplomat's wife. She wasn't a receptionist or some dumb cunt in the typing pool. She had a mind."
"I'm glad one of you did," Monte muttered.
"We were clean on this. I did a surgeon's job. I know it."
"How do you read it then?" Fiona asked.
She had turned slightly in the front seat to see him, but his features were undefined. His shoulders moved, a gesture of frustration and confusion.
"She thought it over. Looked at what she had and what she had just lost, then just cut out. That's the only explanation that makes sense. Women do that. It's not rational. But they do it. I think she just got pissed off and cut out."
"Kessel said she took nothing except the clothes on her back. Nothing."
"No jewelry?" Fiona asked.
"Only what she was wearing," Monte said. "Nothing else. Sam said Kessel was emphatic about that and that was what was scaring the shit out of him."
"Maybe she wanted no part of anything," Bunkie suggested. "She wanted to break clean. It happens."
"Ever happened to you?" Fiona asked.
"Not quite that way. I rather shy away from emotional glue," Bunkie said. Bet you do, she thought. Cold-blooded bastard. She turned again to Monte.
"Kessel is dead-certain about her taking nothing?"
"I just told you," Bunkie interjected snidely. She ignored him. Monte looked at his watch.
"We'll know in ten more minutes. We're meeting the Ambassador."
"Monte thinks it's important that you two get acquainted," Bunkie said. He shot her a look heavy with sarcasm.
"You've done this little chore before?" Fiona asked Bunkie. "The bearer of bad news?"
"I've got a complicated job," he said morosely. They waited through the silence. "He's got this insatiable dick." More silence. "Shit. Yeah two three times. Only when they get serious or pushy."
"Did his wife know?" Fiona asked, her mind set in detective mode, mentally lining up the suspect Force of habit, she told herself, amused with the idea.
"Know? Hard to say. She'd have to be there, wouldn't she?" Bunkie said. "Suspect? Goes with the territory. The fact is the Senator is a family guy."
"Mrs. Langford never raised the issue?"
"Not to me," Bunkie said. "I'd say though that he has plenty to
spare."
"Plenty of what?" Fiona snapped.
"It can rise to any occasion," Bunkie sneered, as if his surrogate duties included the Senator's brag.
"So you also watch," Fiona said with obvious contempt.
When he didn't comme nt, Monte pulled the car away from the curb and started westward up Independence in the direction of the Washington Monument. It was slow going, the rush hour was in full bloom.
"I still don't know why we had to bring her into it," Bunkie said.
"She's a pro is why." Monte said. He patted Fiona on the thigh. "When you report someone missing what happens?"
"Goes into a data bank," Fiona began, explaining the process. "Available to one and all, up to and including the G-men."
"They ever find anyone?" Bunkie asked.
"Sometimes. Unfortunately, it takes more manpower than is ever available. It becomes a lesser police priority as time goes on." She thought suddenly of Betty Taylor's remains. "And harder to find them."
"In this case, the best course is to do nothing," Bunkie said. "That's my call on it from the beginning. The lady will turn up. She's probably already shacking up somewhere in Europe. I figure a woman with that kind of looks can find someone to stake her on a new wardrobe, some baubles, and the price of an air fare. The more I think about it, the more I say we're panicked for nothing."
Monte headed the car around the Lincoln Monument back up Twenty-third to Georgetown, then up Wisconsin Avenue, pulling into a Seven-Eleven parking lot. He did not turn off the motor and after a while another man jumped into the back seat.
"This is Detective Fiona FitzGerald," Monte said. "You remember her, Mr. Ambassador."
"I do," he muttered.
Turning, she could see him in the reflection of light from the neon Seven-Eleven sign. It cast a green pall over all of them, making them seem like frozen victims of some exotic catastrophe, like a poison gas attack.
"We've filled her in, Mr. Ambassador," Monte said.
"Nothing official?"
"Absolutely not, Mr. Ambassador," Monte said, cutting a glance at Fiona for confirmation. "She's merely acting as my friend and advisor."
"I feel ridiculous," the Ambassador said in his Austrian accent, speckled with British pronunciations.
"Her passport, Mr. Ambassador?" Fiona asked with some sense of urgency. "Is it still in your residence?"
"Yes," he said. "That was my first thought, too."
"He knows everything?" she asked Monte.
"Just about," Monte said. He turned toward the Ambassador. "We deemed the stakes too high for secrets." It was, she knew, an ambivalent word, with too many meanings for precision.
"So you see the problem here, Detective FitzGerald," the Ambassador said. She wanted to ask him deeply personal things like how he could ignore, and possibly sanction, his wife having a love affair with another man in their official circle.
It occurred to her that he might have actually encouraged the liaison for his own political reasons, as if the beautiful Helga were a kind of bribe, a sexual favor offered in exchange. For what, she wondered. Except for the Waldheim flap, Austria seemed so benign, so distant f
rom American political machinations. Nevertheless, she made a mental note to find out what committees Sam Langford served on. Again she thought of the remains of Betty Taylor. Cates had spent the day on the Hill checking on the Committee that had employed the unfortunate woman.
Adler, Warren - FitzGerald 03 - Senator Love Page 7