Power Plays (The Lt. Hastings Mysteries)
Page 22
Except for a single patrolman lounging with his back propped against the green concrete wall, the corridor was deserted. Our footsteps echoed and re-echoed as we walked, each of us nodding once to the patrolman as we passed. The patrolman was a stranger to me. Wearing a modified handlebar mustache and hair trimmed as long as departmental regulations allowed, the young patrolman nodded amiably in return. He didn’t bother to push himself away from the wall.
“The new breed,” Cassiday muttered heavily, resigned.
I smiled, then asked, “How’s your family?”
“Fine. Just fine. Peter, you know, graduated. He’s walking a beat down in the Tenderloin.”
“I know. How’s he doing?”
“So far, so good. How’re your kids?”
“Claudia is just starting college, back in Michigan. She’ll be eighteen next month. Darrell just turned fifteen. He was out here to visit me, a few months ago.”
“I know. I saw him at the pistol range. He looks like you, Frank. The spitting image.”
Caught by surprise at the sudden flush of pleasure I felt, I nodded. “That’s what everyone says.”
I’d always liked Cassiday. He was a man who cared what happened to his friends.
At the end of the corridor, Cassiday pointed to the left, down a narrower hallway. Its sidewalls were wood-paneled, decorated with huge photomurals of San Francisco, taken from the air. At the end of the hallway, smiling amiably at me and lifting a hand in a gesture of awkward greeting, I saw the large, lumpy figure of Canelli, my driver.
“There you go, Frank.” Cassiday clapped me lightly on the shoulder. “Good luck. I better get back to my foxhole.”
“Thanks. Give my best to Peter, will you?”
“Sure will, Frank. See you.” He turned back the way he’d come, walking briskly down the pale-green corridor. As I went toward Canelli, I took my shield case from my pocket and pinned my badge on the lapel of my corduroy sports jacket.
“Hello, Lieutenant,” Canelli said affably. “Jeeze, this sure is something. I’m glad to see you.” He was standing with his back to a crowd-control door, one with no handle or lock on the outside. As he spoke, he rapped sharply on the door, which immediately swung open.
Stepping through the doorway with Canelli following close behind, I found myself facing the controlled confusion typical of backstage theater. A ganglia of serpentine power cables covered the floor. Lighting scaffolds towered fifty feet high. Three large motor homes and a half dozen smaller vehicles were arranged in a rough semicircle facing the back of a stage raised ten feet above the floor.
But the scene was strangely frozen. Sounds were muted; movements were hushed and hesitant. Costumed performers sat, or stood, or walked slowly among the cables. Some of them carried musical instruments, some were empty-handed. A group of blue-jeaned stagehands stood apart, clustered at the base of one of the light towers. A half dozen big, tough-looking black men wearing red nylon windbreakers with “Security” stitched across their backs mingled aimlessly with the crowd, deprived of their purpose by dozens of policemen, in and out of uniform. Most of the uniformed policemen stood guard at a rope barricade that divided the Cow Palace amphitheater from the backstage area. The division was defined by multicolored fabric falls and skims hanging from a track suspended from the huge domed ceiling that arched a hundred feet above the floor. Some of the fabric falls were opaque, some semitransparent. Through their gauzy folds I could see the huge oval of the Cow Palace arena. The building could seat seventy-five thousand, rising tier on tier from floor level to the network of enormous curving girders that supported the dome of the ceiling.
From beyond the flimsy fabric falls and skims I heard a low, rhythmic pulsing, primitive enough to have come from the veldt. I recognized that sound. It was the voice of the mob, indecisively muttering. Any moment, though, the sound could erupt into a howl of sudden rage—followed by mayhem.
Beyond the footlights, a beast was growling.
“Over there, Lieutenant.” Canelli gestured to a large aluminum motor home. As he spoke, I heard a woman’s voice blaring through the massive speakers that hung fifteen feet from the amphitheater’s floor, aimed out toward the crowd:
“Here he is. He’s just come over from Oakland—just this minute. So let’s have quiet, please.”
But, when she paused, the beast still muttered and rumbled.
She tried again. “Here he is. He’ll be with us in a second, now. Just as soon as it’s quiet out there. He’s come to talk to you—David Behr, everyone. So let’s, please, hold it down. Let’s listen to David, everyone. What’d you say? How about it, now? He’s right here, backstage. He’s waiting. You can believe it. This is Pam telling you. Pam Cornelison. You know me. You know I don’t jive you. And I’m telling you that David’s here, waiting for a little quiet, so he can talk to you about what’s happened. So let’s have it quiet, now. For David.”
David Behr—a name almost as well known as Rebecca Carlton. David Behr—rock impresario. David Behr—multi-multimillionaire. An immigrant Lebanese, penniless not so long ago. Now a national figure.
And then I saw him: a short, stocky man dressed in wrinkled cords and a fisherman’s sweater. With his neck bowed, with his dark, snapping eyes glowering from under black, beetling brows, he looked a little like Napoleon out of uniform. He was standing between two of the hulking security men at the top of a flight of rough wooden stairs that led up to the stage.
Could he quiet the beast?
At the moment, nothing was more important. Dead bodies can wait. But out in the amphitheater, disaster was boiling.
The woman tried again—and again. She was crooning to the crowd as a mother might croon to a distraught child. Her technique was flawless. Slowly, soothingly, she dropped her voice—and the crowd lowered its voice to hear her.
Finally, Behr took a single quick, decisive step through the parted curtains.
Instantly, the crowd’s voice changed to a note of excitement and anticipation. Through a semitransparent skim, I could see Behr standing at a microphone placed at center stage. He didn’t speak, didn’t gesture. He simply stood perfectly still, imperiously waiting for quiet.
And slowly, the crowd noise dropped. Finally, speaking softly, conversationally, the impresario’s voice came out over the mammoth speakers, amplified thousands of times:
“I felt just like all of you did, when I heard about it. I was driving on the Bay Bridge. I was heading for here, in fact, when I heard. I was hoping to catch Rebecca’s last set. I planned to watch her glow, when she came offstage. I did that for a lot of years, you know—watched her glow, coming offstage.”
He paused. As I listened to the crowd’s voice sink, I saw a beautiful young woman appear from between the parted curtains. It was Pam Cornelison, leaving the stage. She was tall and blonde, dressed in a blue silk jump suit. She descended the short flight of backstage stairs with her back straight and her head held high. She carried herself like a princess, with a hint of royal disdain for the rabble.
Behr was speaking again, confessing to the crowd:
“I suppose,” he said quietly, “that most of you know Rebecca and I were married.” Another pause. And this time, a murmuring note of sympathy came from the crowd. The beast was no longer dangerous. To myself, I nodded. David Behr had a light, sure touch, quieting a crowd. It was a rare, subtle talent.
“We aren’t married any more,” he was saying. “Or, rather—” The voice caught. Was it an actor’s trick? “Or, rather, we weren’t married any more, I should say. But, anyhow, we were always friends—always partners. We worked together on this concert, just like we worked together on all her other concerts—before, during and after we were married.”
Still another short, deft pause. Then, speaking through the powerful sound system in a hushed voice that rolled out across the arena in a rich, throbbing tremulo, Behr said, “And now, Rebecca is dead.”
He paused again, letting it sink in. Whether he knew it or not, he was probing the beas
t’s wound, testing its lingering potential for violence.
“She finished the best concert she ever gave,” he said. “It was a concert dedicated to her father, who died just three weeks ago. She sang the concert, and she gave four encores. And then someone killed her—shot her. You all heard about it. That’s why you’re still here.” He let a beat pass before he added quietly: “And that’s why the police are here.”
At the word “police,” a ripple of anger swept the crowd. But Behr quickly raised his hand, saying sharply, “Wait. Just wait. Quiet down a minute.” It was a command, not a request. And, momentarily at least, they obeyed him.
“Wait now,” he repeated. “Don’t blow your cool, just because you hear a word you don’t like. That’s silly. Just plain silly. Sure, some of us have been hassled by the police. Most of us, maybe, at one time or another. But don’t let’s forget that the police have their problems, too. And, right now, their problem is that they’ve got to get things cooled down here, so they can do what they have to do, to find out who killed Rebecca.”
A dubious murmur greeted the statement. Behr let the rumbling continue, then raised his hand. Obedient now, the crowd quieted.
“You’ve got to help them,” Behr said flatly. “You’ve got to go home. You’ve got to leave here, quietly. You’ve got to get in your cars, and go home. That’s what you’ve got to do, if you want to help find Rebecca’s murderer. And that’s what I’m here to ask you to do—go home. And I’m asking you please. Please.” The last words were spoken in a low, half-broken voice. I wondered whether the emotion was real, or contrived.
He stood motionless for a moment, head slightly bowed over the microphone. Then, slowly and deliberately, completely in control of his audience, he turned and walked offstage. It had been a masterful performance. And, out beyond the footlights, I could sense that the crowd was moving sluggishly toward the exits, obeying him.
I turned again toward the huge aluminum mobile home, following Canelli as he led the way. I stepped over a tangled skein of electrical cables, rounded the far corner of the aluminum monster and found myself facing a grimly familiar scene: a dead body, surrounded by a solemn semicircle of policemen.
Buy Mankiller Now!
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1979 by Collin Wilcox
Cover design by Michel Vrana
978-1-4804-4717-2
This 2013 edition published by MysteriousPress.com/Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
www.mysteriouspress.com
www.openroadmedia.com
THE LT. HASTINGS MYSTERIES
FROM MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM
AND OPEN ROAD MEDIA
Available wherever ebooks are sold
Otto Penzler, owner of the Mysterious Bookshop in Manhattan, founded the Mysterious Press in 1975. Penzler quickly became known for his outstanding selection of mystery, crime, and suspense books, both from his imprint and in his store. The imprint was devoted to printing the best books in these genres, using fine paper and top dust-jacket artists, as well as offering many limited, signed editions.
Now the Mysterious Press has gone digital, publishing ebooks through MysteriousPress.com.
MysteriousPress.com offers readers essential noir and suspense fiction, hard-boiled crime novels, and the latest thrillers from both debut authors and mystery masters. Discover classics and new voices, all from one legendary source.
FIND OUT MORE AT
WWW.MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM
FOLLOW US:
@emysteries and Facebook.com/MysteriousPressCom
MysteriousPress.com is one of a select group of publishing partners of Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
Open Road Integrated Media is a digital publisher and multimedia content company. Open Road creates connections between authors and their audiences by marketing its ebooks through a new proprietary online platform, which uses premium video content and social media.
Videos, Archival Documents, and New Releases
Sign up for the Open Road Media newsletter and get news delivered straight to your inbox.
Sign up now at
www.openroadmedia.com/newsletters
FIND OUT MORE AT
WWW.OPENROADMEDIA.COM
FOLLOW US:
@openroadmedia and
Facebook.com/OpenRoadMedia