by Stuart Woods
“Yeah,” Leary said, “but it’s three murders.”
“The cabdriver and who else?” Stone asked.
“The cabdriver and two other cabdrivers,” Leary said. “Don’t you watch TV or nothing?”
“I got a late start this morning,” Stone said. “You mean three cabdrivers on the same day?”
“On the same night, all within an hour of each other,” Leary said. “We got a fucking wildcat cabdrivers’ strike going, you know that? Park Avenue is a parking lot. There’s two thousand cabs just sitting there. You didn’t notice?”
“ Park Avenue isn’t on my way to work,” Stone said.
“You’re lucky you and Bacchetti are still on Nijinsky,” Leary said. “The mayor wasn’t interested personally, you wouldn’t be. What’ve you got on the lady?”
“Zip,” Dino said.
“Some ideas,” Stone said, shooting Dino a glance.
“What ideas?” Leary asked.
“We want a search warrant on Van Fleet,” Stone said.
“Dino’s been telling me about him,” Leary replied. “I like him for this. You got enough for the warrant?”
“The letters ought to do it. We can demonstrate his undue interest in Nijinsky.”
“See Judge O’Neal,” Leary said. “She’s got a hair up her ass about anything to do with any crime against women. She’ll buy the letters.”
“Right.”
“What else you got?”
“Zip,” Dino replied.
Stone shrugged. “It’s not as though the effort hasn’t been made. Every single co-worker has been interviewed; every hospital, clinic, and funeral parlor in the city, Long Island, and New Jersey has been contacted. I want to go through all her stuff today, just as soon as we’ve searched Van Fleet’s place.”
“I buy the effort,” Leary said. “It’s a bitch, ain’t it?”
“It is,” Dino agreed. “I never knew of nobody going up the pipe like this broad. It’s spooky.”
“I’ll call the chief this morning; he’ll talk to the mayor. I’ll tell’em we need more time.”
“We do,” Stone said.
“Go to it.” Leary put his feet on his desk and picked up the telephone.
Stone followed Dino out of Leary’s office. “You call Judge O’Neal’s secretary for an appointment. I’ve got a call to make.” He sat down at his desk, dug out Cary ’s card, and called her direct line. He got her on the first ring.
“ Cary Hilliard.”
“Morning.”
“Well, good morning to you!” She was laughing.
“How are you?”
Her voice moved nearer the phone, and she whispered. “I’m sore as hell, and I feel great!”
“Same here” – Stone laughed – “but I’m not sure great describes it; it’s somewhere above that.”
“I’m free this evening,” she said.
“No you’re not; you’ve got a dinner date.”
“I’ll be done here by seven forty-five. Have you been to the Tribeca Grill?”
“Is that De Niro’s new place?”
“That’s it. Shall I book us a table?”
“Come to my house first, for a drink.”
“You’re on. I’ll book for nine o’clock. See you at eight.”
“You betcha.”
When Stone hung up, Dino was looking at him.
“You got laid, didn’t you?”
“What are you talking about?” Stone dissembled.
“I can tell.” Dino batted his eyes rapidly. “You’re just glowing all over.”
“Jesus Christ! Do I have to take this shit from my own partner?”
“You betcha,” Dino said, imitating Stone.
“What about Judge O’Neal?”
“Half an hour.”
“What are we going to do for some help with the search?” Stone asked. “Nobody here.”
“Well, shit,” Dino replied, “if you and me between us can’t find a corpse in a funeral parlor, we ought to turn in our papers.”
Stone led the way out. “She’s still alive, Dino. I can feel it.”
“When I can feel her, I’ll believe it,” Dino called after him, hustling to keep up.
Judge O’Neal was youngish, blonde, and extremely good-looking. She sat in her high-backed, leather chair, her robes thrown open and her legs crossed, and contemplated Stone.
Stone contemplated right back. The woman had been wearing an engagement ring during the year since he had first come across her, or he would have asked her out.
“The letters are enough for me,” O’Neal said, “even if he doesn’t talk dirty. A thousand letters is weird enough for a warrant. Nobody’s going to overrule.”
“I shouldn’t think so,” Stone said. “By the way, we’ve included his place of work in the warrant.”
“Off the record, Detective, for my own curiosity, what do you think happened to this woman?”
“Off the record, Judge, I am completely baffled, but I think she may still be alive.”
O’Neal’s eyebrows went up. “Get serious.”
Stone explained his terminal velocity theory.
O’Neal shook her head vigorously, and the blonde hair swirled around her shoulders. “That,” she said, “is the wildest theory I ever heard.”
“It may not be plausible, but it’s possible.”
Judge O’Neal uncrossed her legs and leaned on her desk, resting her chin in her hand. “I’ve got a hundred bucks says she’s stone dead – you should excuse the expression.”
Stone laughed. “I’ll take your bet, but the loser buys dinner.”
O’Neal pursed her red lips for a moment, then smiled. “You’re on,” she said, signing the warrant.
In the car, Dino looked sideways at Stone while dodging a bicycle messenger. “Jesus, Stone, why didn’t you just fuck her right there on the desk? I’d have been happy to watch.”
“Come on, Dino.”
“She’s got the hots for you, I’m telling you.”
“She’s wearing an engagement ring.”
“So what the fuck? She was wearing a wedding ring, that’s maybe cause for pause, maybe. A diamond ring is an open door. Anyway, you got a dinner date, just as soon as we find Sasha, dead or alive.”
Stone glanced at his watch. “Van Fleet should be at the funeral parlor by now. We’ll serve him there, then do the apartment.”
Chapter 12
Herbert Van Fleet’s mother didn’t like it. Stone and Dino waited quietly while Mrs. Van Fleet called her lawyer.
She returned grim faced. “All right, how do you want to go about this?”
“We’d like to see every room in the building,” Stone said.
“What are you looking for?” she demanded.
“Anything that might help us in our investigation,” Dino said, none too politely.
Seething, the woman took them through the building. Stone saw nothing out of the ordinary – at least, out of the ordinary for a funeral parlor. They finished up in the embalming room, where Herbert Van Fleet was working on a corpse. A tube ran from the man’s stomach to a pump, and the machine whirred quietly. Stone looked away.
Van Fleet looked up without surprise. “Well, well, look who’s back. I’m not answering any further questions, gentlemen, except in the presence of my lawyer.”
Stone handed him the warrant, and, while Van Fleet read it carefully, he went to a row of large drawers.
“I’ll do this,” Stone said to Dino. “I wouldn’t want you to faint on me.”
Two elderly men were the only occupants of the refrigerated storage drawers. Stone and Dino had a look in an adjacent storage room, then returned.
“All right,” Van Fleet said, “when do you want to go to my apartment?”
“Immediately,” Stone replied.
Van Fleet turned to his mother. “But what about Mr. Edmonson?” he asked plaintively, gesturing toward the corpse on the table.
“Just pop him in the fridge,” Dino said
. “He’ll keep.”
“You’d better go with them,” Mrs. Van Fleet said to her son. “They’ll wreck your place if you’re not there.”
Van Fleet nodded, went to a sink, washed his hands, removed his rubber apron, revealing that he was dressed in a three-piece suit, and said to the officers, “I’m ready.”
Van Fleet didn’t speak on the way downtown. His building was in SoHo, near the river, and the street seemed to have been missed in the gentrification of the area. A sign on the dusty windows of the empty ground floor read WEINSTEIN’S FINE GLOVES. Van Fleet unlocked a steel door and led them into a vestibule and onto a freight elevator.
“Who else lives in the building?” Stone asked.
“Nobody,” Van Fleet replied genially. “My mother and I bought it as an investment last year. I had planned to renovate the rest of the building and rent lofts, but I ran out of money. Maybe next year.”
“Did the glove factory occupy the whole place?”
“No, there was a kosher meat-processing plant and a piecework sewing business, and offices on the top floor, where I live.”
The elevator stopped. Van Fleet pushed back the gate and unlocked another large steel door.
“It’s sort of like a fortress, isn’t it?” Dino said.
“I shouldn’t have to tell you what a problem burglary is in this city,” Van Fleet said. Inside the door, he tapped a code into a keypad. “I’ve got a very decent alarm system, too.”
Stone watched him.
Van Fleet led them into a large, open space. A kitchen had been built in a corner at the far end and a bedroom in the other corner. These rooms were separated from the rest of the loft by a framework of lumber that had not yet had plasterboard applied to it. “I’m doing most of the work on the place myself,” Van Fleet said.
Light flooded the loft from three sides; the other abutted another building.
“Nice place, Herb,” Dino said admiringly.
“You may call me Mr. Van Fleet,” Van Fleet said, almost sweetly. He turned to Stone. “You may call me Herbert, if you wish.”
“Thank you, Herbert,” Stone said. “I feel for you, doing your own remodeling. I’m doing the same, myself.” He said this while walking the length of the highly polished oak floor, the expanse of which was broken only by an occasional Oriental rug. A sofa, two chairs, a lamp, and a television set had been placed on one rug, an island of a living room surrounded by hardwood. The two detectives went methodically through the place, but there was hardly anywhere to hide anything. Van Fleet’s desk rested against one wall. Stone opened the drawers and found nothing he wouldn’t have seen in his own desk drawers: bills, stationery, office supplies.
“Let’s see the rest of the building,” Stone said to Van Fleet. His warrant did not cover the whole building, but he hoped the man wouldn’t notice.
Van Fleet didn’t. He went to a kitchen drawer and retrieved a large key ring, which jangled as he led them to the elevator. They walked through the building a floor at a time. Van Fleet may not have had the money to complete his development project, but he had cleaned out the building; it was as empty as any place Stone had ever seen.
“Anything else?” Stone said to Dino.
Dino shook his head.
“Can we offer you a lift uptown, Herbert?”
“Thank you, no,” Van Fleet replied. “As long as I’m here, I’ll have my lunch and get a cab later. Sorry I couldn’t be more helpful,” he said sweetly.
“You’ve been very helpful, Herbert,” Stone said, “and we appreciate your cooperation.”
“Have you found out anything else about Sasha?” Van Fleet asked.
“I’m afraid we can’t discuss an investigation in progress,” Stone said.
“The papers said you’re making no progress at all,” Van Fleet said, walking them to the front door.
“Don’t believe everything you read in the papers,” Dino said, as Van Fleet closed the door behind them.
Back in the car, Stone sighed. “Clean as a hound’s tooth,” he said.
“Yeah,” Dino agreed, disconsolately.
“Let’s go up to Sasha’s and go through those boxes.”
“Okay.”
There was a different doorman on duty when the detectives arrived at the building. Stone flashed his badge and asked for his key to the Nijinsky apartment. The man handed it over silently.
The moment they stepped off the elevator, it was obvious that something was wrong. The police notice fixed to the apartment door had been removed.
“The seal’s broken,” Dino said. “What the fuck?”
Stone led the way into the apartment. It was completely empty. The two men stood there looking helplessly about them, as if waiting for inspiration. Stone bent over and picked up a card from the floor.
Effective immediately,
Sasha Nijinsky is at
1011 Fifth Ave.
New York 10021.
Burn this.
“The movers,” Stone said.
“What?”
“The movers. She was moving the next morning.”
“What’s the new address?”
“Ten-eleven Fifth.” Stone didn’t mention that he knew someone else at that address.
“Let’s go see the doorman.”
Downstairs, Stone braced the doorman. “There was a police seal on the door of the Nijinsky apartment,” he said. “Who broke it?”
“Jesus, Officer,” the man pled, “I don’t know nothing. The moving people showed up and took her stuff; that’s all I know.”
They drove uptown in silence. The building was across the street from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The doorman greeted them.
“Can I help you, gentlemen?” he said, blocking the entrance.
Stone showed his ID. “Miss Nijinsky’s apartment.”
“Yes? What about it?”
“We’d like to see it. This is part of a police investigation. Did some moving people bring some furniture and boxes here yesterday?”
“Yes, but I’m afraid I can’t let you into the apartment without permission, unless you’ve got a search warrant, of course.”
Dino sighed loudly. “I guess you know the lady’s in no condition to give permission.”
The doorman shrugged. “My hands are tied,” he said, “unless you get permission from the cooperative’s board of directors. If one of them says it’s okay, I’ll let you in.”
“Who’s the chairman of the cooperative’s board?” Stone asked.
The doorman went to a tin box on his desk and produced an index card. He handed it to Stone.
The name on the card was Barron Harkness.
Stone registered this for a moment, then showed the card to Dino. “May I use your telephone?” he asked the doorman.
“Sure,” the man said, placing a phone on the desk.
“An interesting connection, wouldn’t you say?” he asked Dino. He checked his notebook and dialed the number of the network.
Chapter 13
A woman answered Harkness’s phone, a voice Stone didn’t recognize.
“Barron Harkness, please. My name is Barrington; he knows me.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Barrington, Mr. Harkness is in a meeting. May I have him return the call?”
“Let me speak with Cary Hilliard, please.”
“Ms. Hilliard is in the same meeting.”
Stone tried not to sound annoyed. “Please take a note to Mr. Harkness. Tell him Detective Stone Barrington would like to speak with him at once, and that it’s important.”
“I’m sorry, but-”
“Please do it now. This is police business.”
The woman hesitated. “All right,” she said finally. “What is your number?”
“I’ll hold.”
An irritating minute passed, then: “Barron Harkness.”
“Mr. Harkness, this is Stone Barrington. I’m at your apartment building, and I want your permission to enter Sasha Nijinsky’s apartment. The doorman i
nsists on speaking with you before allowing entry.”
“But why?” Harkness asked. “Sasha never moved into the apartment; there’s nothing there. Legally, she didn’t even own the apartment; she was supposed to have closed on it the morning after she…”
“It appears that a moving company followed instructions she gave before her disappearance and moved her belongings into the apartment. The doorman let them in.”
Harkness hesitated, then spoke. “I’ll be right over there,” he said, and hung up before Stone could speak further.
Stone replaced the receiver and turned to Dino. “Harkness is coming over here.”
“Why?” Dino asked.
“Who knows? Maybe he’s being protective of his building’s reputation.”
The doorman spoke up. “That sounds like Mr. Harkness,” he said. “He and the board are very picky about what goes on here. That’s why I wouldn’t let you in. It woudda been my job, y’know.”
Stone nodded, then joined Dino on a sofa in the lobby to wait for Harkness.
They didn’t have to wait long. A black Lincoln Town Car pulled up at the curb, and Harkness strode into the building. He shook hands with Stone and was introduced to Dino. “All right,” he said, “let’s get this over with. I’ve got to get back to the office.”
“We don’t really need you for this,” Stone said, “if you’d like to go back now.”
Harkness fished a letter from an inside pocket and handed it to Stone. It was from a midtown law firm.
“You’re her executor?” Stone asked. “But we don’t even know that she’s dead.”
“I got the letter this morning; it was the first I’d heard of it.” He shrugged. “I guess I’m representing Sasha in this,” he said, “so, unless you want to get a search warrant, I’m going to have to go into that apartment with you.”
“All right,” Stone said.
“Eddie,” Harkness said to the doorman, “I’ll use my pass-key. We won’t need you.”
On the elevator, Stone turned to Harkness. “You say you didn’t know that Ms. Nijinsky had appointed you executor of her will?”