The Rock 'n Roll Detective's Greatest Hits - A Spike Berenger Anthology

by Raymond Benson

  “No, it doesn’t,” Prescott answered. “It’s sad.”

  “Anyway, I didn’t think he was violent—that is, violent towards other people. I knew he was a danger to himself. But something happened that brought him out of the ditch he was in.”

  “What was that?”

  “He heard me sing.”

  “Tell us about that.”

  “I had been singing all my life. I joined the church choir and sang in the choirs at school. When I was on my own as a teenager, I started performing with an ensemble that traveled the country and sang church music. It was good experience, but I wanted to write and sing my own songs. So I did. It was a very difficult life. For a while I lived in Rome and tried to make it in the music scene there, but eventually I came back to Milan. And then Stuart gave me a tape. He said it was some demos that my mother had made before she… disappeared. He urged me to learn them. And I did. They were a perfect fit for me. I loved the songs. In fact, they inspired me in my own writing, and I could say that my songs are very similar in style to hers.

  “Anyway, Stuart became obsessed with my making an album. He was convinced that my studio recordings were great. Mostly I did my own original songs, but I covered a couple of my mother’s. But, I don’t know, Father somehow mixed up everything. He called me Sylvia at times. He forgot I was her daughter. And then he was Sylvia at times, and she was telling him that it was her album and that he owed it to her to get it made.” Julia gave them a sad smile. “My friends… my father had a very, very troubled mind. By the time he left for Chicago in nineteen-ninety-two, he didn’t know if I was Sylvia or Julia, or if he was Stuart or Sylvia. I feared for him. I tried to keep in touch, but he stopped writing. He moved and changed his contact details. It was as if he cut me out of his life. After a while, I was afraid that he may have died. I had no way of knowing.”

  “I think I understand what happened,” Prescott said. “The Sylvia persona was so strong in him, that he couldn’t accept you as a surrogate Sylvia. There was only one Sylvia, and she was within him.”

  “I think you’re right.”

  “But why did he start killing his former band members?” Case asked.

  “I don’t think we’ll ever know,” Julia answered.

  “I can guess,” Berenger said. “It was the guilt. All the guys contributed to Sylvia’s death. They all covered it up. He lived with that horrible secret and it tortured his weak and sick mind. Finally, after so many years, it culminated in murder. It was the only way he could live with himself. He had to fulfill two goals. One was seeing that your album was made because in his mind it was some kind of tribute to Sylvia. Atonement. The second was avenging Sylvia’s death, and that including killing Stuart Clayton—himself.”

  Everyone was quiet until Ponti said, “Mama mia.” That brought a few chuckles of relief from everyone in the room.

  Berenger thought of the two familiar names he saw in the large body room. “I wonder how much guilt weighed on Joe, for instance?” he asked. “How much did it trouble any of the other guys? Surely they had nightmares about it. Surely they were haunted by Sylvia’s ghost.”

  Prescott said, “It’s probably why they were all so ready to believe that it was her ghost that was killing them all off.”

  Then they were all quiet for a moment. Case eventually asked Julia if she was finished. She nodded.

  “I’ll tell the attendant,” Case said. “Then I guess we can get out of here.”

  Julia turned to them. “Thank you for listening. I’ve never told that story to anyone.”

  “You’re welcome,” Berenger said. “It had to be told and I’m glad you trusted us enough to do so.”

  She smiled. “Are you still going to try and get the album made?”

  He nodded. “It’s a good record. I think I know some people who can get it in the right hands at a major label. Credited to you, of course. I figure the songwriting credits will be shared by you and your mother. Is that fair?”

  “Yes, thank you. I would be very grateful. It’s been a long, hard road for me. It will be ironic that I make my first album when I’m in my forties.”

  “Stranger things have happened.”

  She looked down at her father. “That’s certainly true.”

  30

  Lucky Man

  (performed by Emerson, Lake & Palmer)

  Berenger and Prescott returned to New York that evening, having said their goodbyes to their friends in Chicago, officially informed the kind folks at the Fourteenth District and Area Five of their departure, and paid the parking ticket they had received on the previous Friday night. Berenger was warned that his headache may worsen while he flew—and it did. By the time they had picked up their luggage at Baggage Claim, the PI truly felt like crap.

  The couple shared a taxi from LaGuardia. Since Prescott lived in the East Village and Berenger lived on the Upper East Side, it was more practical to drop him off first. The cab pulled up to his building on East 68th Street and he turned to Prescott.

  “I’ll call you?”

  Prescott wasn’t sure why he felt the need to ask that question. “Sure.” She gave a little shrug.

  Berenger nodded.

  “You rest,” she told him. “You know, you’re a lucky man.”

  He nodded again. “See ya.” He got out, closed the door, and walked away.

  Berenger picked up the week’s worth of junk mail and took the elevator to his apartment. He unlocked the door, stepped inside, and dropped his luggage on the floor, went to the kitchen, and placed the mail on the counter. The red light on the answering machine was blinking. He punched the button and heard Linda’s voice.

  “Hi, Spike, I’m calling you from the hotel in Chicago. I tried to reach you while you were still here, but they said you’d checked out. I, uhm, wanted to let you know that Richard and I have decided to just go ahead and take the plunge. We’re going to get married this week. I know it’s kind of sudden, but it’s what we feel like doing. We’re flying to Las Vegas tonight—assuming it’s still Monday when you get this message—to do the deed. I know, it’s pretty crazy and you probably can’t believe I’m going to get married in Las Vegas. Well, it’s true. Unless I get cold feet at the last minute, which I don’t think will happen, I’m going to do it. So, even though you didn’t have to be, I wanted you to be the first to know, Spike. I’m going to call Michael and Pam now and tell them. So now you can’t say I let your kids know before I told you.

  “I also wanted to say it was a surprise seeing you and Suzanne in Chicago, but it turned out all right. It was actually kind of nice to see you. Richard liked you a lot. I had to suffer through him going into the Virgin Megastore to find some of the bands you mentioned. I hope you haven’t corrupted him, Spike, I really do.

  “Anyway, we’ll come back to New York after a short honeymoon in Vegas. I didn’t want you to wonder where I was. I hope you solved your case, whatever it was. Bye.”

  And that was it.

  That was it? She tells him she’s getting hitched in Vegas and that’s it?

  Berenger played the whole message again to make sure he didn’t miss anything. Nope, she didn’t say “hope to see you again soon,” or “love you,” or “I’ll talk to you later”… not that she was obligated to do so. He wasn’t sure if she had been flaunting her decision to get married immediately, of if she was simply informing him. The latter was, of course, the right thing to do. He supposed it could have been both, but Linda wasn’t the type to say, “nyah nyah nyah, look what I’m doing and you’re not.” They had moved past hurting each other for sport a long time ago.

  He supposed he wished her well. But how could he send flowers or a card if he didn’t know where they were getting married? Maybe Pam would know.

  Funny thing, that. Linda was marrying Mr. Clean. His new best friend.

  Berenger sighed heavily and took a look at the mail. He then went back to the entry hall, picked up his suitcase, and took it to the bedroom. Thirty minutes later, he
had unpacked, watered the two plants he kept in the living room, and then went back into the kitchen for the phone. He dialed a number he knew by heart.

  “Yeah?”

  “Charlie, it’s Spike.”

  “Hey, Spike. What’s up?”

  “I just got back from Chicago.”

  “Chicago? Were you on a case?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How’d it go?”

  “Not so good.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  “You want to come over and jam?”

  Berenger could hear Charlie Potts stretch the way he did—like a cat waking from a nap. “Oh, I don’t know, Spike. I’m kind of settled in for the evening. It’s a Monday. I’m watching TV.”

  “Okay. Some other time.”

  “Some other time.”

  He hung up, stared at the phone, and dialed another number he knew from memory.

  “Hello?”

  “Suzanne?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You made it home all right?”

  “Sure. Why wouldn’t I?”

  “Oh, I was just calling to make sure. Hey, you feel like going out for a meal or a drink or something?”

  “Spike, you can’t have a drink or something.”

  “Oh, yeah. I keep forgetting.”

  “Well, remember. It’s important.”

  “So how about a meal? Split a pizza or something? I hated that Chicago pizza we ate. New York will always have the best pizza, don’t you agree?”

  “I do agree, but Spike, I’m exhausted. I just got home and I am dead. Really, I can’t imagine how you’ve got the energy to want to go out.”

  “I don’t know, I just walked into my apartment and it felt strange. Like I needed to get out of it for a while.”

  “You were just out of it for a whole week, Spike. Geez. Listen, you still have a head injury and, face it, you went through some serious psychological torture the other night. You can’t take it for granted or poo-poo it. That was some heavy shit Stuart Clayton did to you—to us—and I think it’s okay that you feel strange. I feel strange, too. But I also feel very tired. So I’m going to hang up, and I’ll see you at the office tomorrow, right?”

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “Spike?”

  “Yes, Suzanne. I’m fine.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay.”

  “Bye.”

  “Bye.”

  Berenger hung up, opened the cabinet, removed the bottle of Jack Daniel’s, grabbed a glass from the cupboard, and poured himself a couple of inches. He set down the bottle, picked up the glass, put it to his lips…

  …and remembered that he wasn’t supposed to drink alcohol for three weeks.

  “Shiiiiiiit,” he groaned.

  He tried to pour the whiskey back into the bottle, but ended up spilling most of it. He cursed again, washed his hands, put the Jack away, and opened the refrigerator. There stood a carton of Pulp Free Minute Maid orange juice. The expiration date was still good, too.

  He rinsed out the glass and filled it with juice. He took the glass and went straight to his music room, a space that he had converted into a small recording studio and practice room. It’s where he and Charlie always jammed. It’s where he spent many a night laying down guitar solos or pieces of unfinished songs with a glass or two of Jack or bourbon or beer or wine or vodka…

  Berenger turned on the mixer, the amplifiers, the microphones, the recording equipment, and then moved to the middle of the studio. He sat on his stool, placed the drink beside him on a small table that was there for that purpose, and picked up his DBZ acoustic guitar from its stand.

  It had been an extraordinary, frustrating week and he felt very unsettled about it. It was possibly the most disturbing case he’d ever worked on and its closure was far from pleasant. Berenger wasn’t sure if he could call the job a success simply because the perpetrator was dead. Eleven other people were also gone—ten men and a woman who were talented musicians. And then there was the legacy of what happened to Sylvia Favero and everything it wrought. It was almost as if a curse really had befallen the members of The Loop and its two offspring—Windy City Engine and Red Skyez.

  Had he failed? Could he have stopped Stuart Clayton from killing the final few? Had he not worked hard enough or fast enough? He didn’t know the answers to those questions, but he also figured there was nothing more he could have done to identify Clayton sooner.

  Prescott was right. They had been through something remarkable and possibly significant. Perhaps the biggest question Berenger needed to ask was—had the experience changed him in any way?

  He didn’t know the answer to that one either, so he strummed an A minor seventh chord, held it, and then played a D minor seventh. The combination had enough of a melancholic quality to suit his mood, so he continued to alternate between the two. It eventually worked its way into an old prog ballad that he had written with The Fixers—it had been their attempt at something similar to one of ELP’s vocal numbers like “Lucky Man” or “From the Beginning.” The song was called “I Crossed to the Other Side,” and it was a personal favorite of Berenger’s repertoire. In his low, gravelly, Beefheart-like voice, the PI sang the tune.

  And then he sang another.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Raymond Benson is the author of six original James Bond novels, including the three recently re-printed in the 2008 anthology The Union Trilogy—High Time to Kill, DoubleShot, and Never Dream of Dying. He also novelized the screenplays for three 007 films. His Bond short stories have been published in Playboy and TV Guide magazines. He wrote the non-fiction books The Pocket Essentials Guide to Jethro Tull and The James Bond Bedside Companion (the latter was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Biographical/Critical Work in 1984). As “David Michaels,” Raymond penned the first two NY Times best-selling action/adventure novels in the Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell series. More recently, Raymond has written original suspense thrillers such as Sweetie’s Diamonds, Face Blind, and Evil Hours. His best-selling novelization of Konami’s popular videogame, Metal Gear Solid, was published in 2008. In addition to his work as an author, Raymond has extensive experience directing stage plays, composing music, teaching film studies, and designing and writing adventure computer games. And he performs on piano at a cocktail lounge on Mondays and Tuesdays.

  www.raymondbenson.com