by Joseph Flynn
“Let’s put it this way. Glynnis was the one who told me the dinners and the snacks that Mr. Tibbot’s guests preferred, so I could plan my menus accordingly.”
“Very thorough,” Tall Wolf said. “I suspect she might know a name or two.”
“Me, too. She’s too anal retentive to tell me. Maybe you can do better.”
There was a poorly hidden note of glee in Ms. Parisi’s voice.
“I’ll bet I can,” he said.
Because now he had evidence that Glynnis Crowther had lied to a federal agent.
Tall Wolf uploaded a copy of David Kaufman’s e-mail and the notes he’d made of his conversation with Dana Parisi to a secure cloud server. One not belonging to the federal government and not accessible by Coyote. He closed his laptop, thinking that the Internet had replaced shoe leather as an investigator’s tool of choice.
He was standing outside the Marriott’s main entrance when Keely Powell pulled up.
She lowered the passenger side window, leaned over and asked, “Mr. Modesty?”
Keely brought up the subject that was too sensitive to discuss with Ron Ketchum.
She asked John Tall Wolf, “You think, maybe, Clay Steadman hired someone to kill Hale Tibbot?”
The two of them were headed to the house the late real estate mogul had rented to Glynnis Crowther below market rate. David Kaufman, Tibbot’s accountant, had provided Tall Wolf with a list of perks he’d provided to his employees.
Tall Wolf said, “It’s a possibility … I never liked his movies enough to extend him a presumption of innocence.”
Keely laughed.
“Me neither. Does that mean we’d feel more kindly to someone whose movies we did like? If so, who?”
“Paul Newman,” Tall Wolf said.
“Good one. We’d have given him a break just because we’re fans?”
“No. Well, maybe. Newman’s characters were always cool. But they were flawed, too. I could see him getting booted out of a political office and laughing about it. Like he’d been expecting it all along. He’d probably walk out the door and say something like, ‘About damn time.’”
Keely looked at Tall Wolf and laughed. She agreed.
Tall Wolf said, “I don’t see Clay Steadman doing that. He’s too smart to personally gun down someone challenging his alpha male status — the way his movie persona would — but I can see him hiring the job out.”
Keely liked the way Tall Wolf thought.
“How old are you?” she asked.
He told her. Not yet forty. She was right, too damn young for her.
He had the grace not to ask why she’d asked, though.
So maybe there was something to being a cougar after all.
“How about Walt Ketchum?” Keely asked.
“I don’t think he did it, from what I’ve read about him. If he’d killed Tibbot, it would have been a more straightforward, old-fashioned crime. A shooting. He’d probably call 911 to turn himself in. The responding cops might find him with his feet up on Tibbot’s desk and a glass of the man’s whiskey in his hand. Does that square with what you know of him?”
Keely pulled to a stop in front a small detached house with flower beds out front.
A Pinnacle Security sign on the lawn, too, Tall Wolf saw.
Keely told him, “I’ve actually met the man a couple of times. Quite the character. A real-life example of how a lot of bad-cop stereotypes get started. He retired on April 30, 1992, the first full day of the Rodney King riots. He quit when Chief Daryl Gates wouldn’t let LAPD go out and kick ass. ‘Gun the rioting bastards down,’ to use Walt’s words.”
“Really?” Tall Wolf asked.
“Oh, yeah. He told me his parting words to his commanding officer were, ‘See if you can send a mob by my house. I’ll show you how to handle this thing.’”
“A wish that went unfulfilled, I take it.”
“Yeah, but my point is, I think you’re right. Walt would have handled things head on.”
“You almost sound as if you like the man.”
Keely nodded. “I do have a bit of soft spot for him. He told me, in a private moment, he’d rather see his son with me than with his wife, Leilani.”
Tall Wolf was not about to touch that one.
He said, “Let’s go talk with Ms. Crowther.”
Ron Ketchum read the autopsy report on Hale Tibbot he’d received from Dr. Perri Dahlgren’s office. Circulatory system collapse due to severe blood loss was listed as the official cause of Hale Tibbot’s death. A contributing cause, initially unsuspected, was a displaced cervical vertebra. Not fractured, displaced. Like maybe the killer was some sort of psychotic chiropractor.
Dr. Dahlgren suggested that Tibbot might have suffered traumatic paralysis and had been unable to defend himself from his attacker.
Helluva combination, Ron thought. The killer wrecked the guy’s neck from behind and then drained him of half his blood. Tibbot could have been alive, maybe even conscious, as he’d bled out. Even if he hadn’t been able to feel what was happening to him, he might have known he was being murdered.
For who knew how long.
Ron wanted to get the bastard more than ever.
He was just about to call for Sergeant Stanley when there was a knock on his door and the sergeant stepped into his office. “Sorry to bother you, Chief.”
“That’s all right, Sarge. I was just going to call you.”
“Something you need?”
Ron nodded. “Please get in touch with LAPD. Ask them if we might have a copy of their booking photo for a man named Nikos Sideris.” He spelled the name and the sergeant took it down. “If there are photos from more than one arrest, I’d like the one where my father and his partner Paul Martin were the arresting officers. If the LA cops ask, tell them it’s relevant to a homicide case we’re working.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Was there something you wanted to see me about?” the chief asked.
“Mayor Steadman would like to see you in his office, Chief.”
Glynnis Crowther took a peek through the look-see in her front door, saw John Tall Wolf and Keely Powell and said, “What do you want? Do you have a warrant?”
“No,” Tall Wolf said. “Would you like me to get one? I can leave my colleague here while I do.”
Keely gave the visible rectangle of Glynnis’ face a cheerful wave.
“I don’t have anything more to tell you,” Glynnis said with a whine.
“I believe you do,” Tall Wolf told her. “If you insist you don’t, I’ll have to arrest you for lying to a federal agent.”
“But I didn’t —”
Tall Wolf held up his hand. “Don’t do it again. That would be a separate count. Under Title 18 Section 1001 of the United States Code, you can be tried for each offense.”
“Five years for each count, right?” Keely asked.
“Eight, if there’s domestic or international terrorism involved,” Tall Wolf said.
“Shows you how serious this is,” Keely told Glynnis.
Tall Wolf summed up, “I’ve already got you on one count. You sure you don’t want to talk?”
The look-see closed. The door opened. Tall Wolf and Keely stepped inside.
Appropriate to a housekeeper’s domicile, the place was spotless.
“That doesn’t seem American,” Glynnis complained. “That law you mentioned.”
“Free speech doesn’t mean you get to lie to federal agents,” Tall Wolf said.
“Do you get to lie to me?”
“If necessary, but I wasn’t lying about Title 18. That’s for real.”
Glynnis looked at her two unwelcome guests. Her instinct and training to be courteous contended with her desire to be rid of these pests — and not wind up in a federal prison.
By way of a compromise, she gestured to two arm chairs and said, “Sit.”
The special agent and retired detective did, after they saw Glynnis take a place on a love seat opposite them. They wanted to be sure she wo
uldn’t be so foolish as to attempt a getaway.
Tall Wolf told her, “You said to me, with Chief Ketchum as a witness, that you wouldn’t know anything about whether Mr. Tibbot entertained overnight guests at his house here in town. I’ve since learned that little if anything escaped your notice about who entered that house. That you would have made it your business to know about anyone who spent the night there.”
Glynnis grimaced, understanding that she’d been ratted out.
“You care to comment, Ms. Crowther?” Keely asked.
“I’m thinking about calling a lawyer.”
Tall Wolf told her, “That’s certainly your right. If he’s smart, he’ll tell you to cooperate with us. You’ll be on the hook for his fee and … you never know how the U.S. attorney will feel about your seeking representation. He might think you’re being a pain in the ass who could use some prison time to gain a better perspective.”
Keely added, “Probably be worse if you get a female U.S. attorney. They’re the real hardasses.”
Glynnis looked from one cop to the other.
“How do I know you’re not lying to me now? That there isn’t anything I can do to help myself?”
“You don’t,” Tall Wolf said. “All you can do is use your best judgment.”
She shook her head. “It isn’t fair that only one side can lie.”
“Tell it to your congressman,” Keely told her.
“All right then.” She looked at Tall Wolf. “I was just trying to do the right thing. Keeping a gentleman’s social life private, that’s something that shouldn’t be betrayed even after he’s dead.”
Keely said, “Very noble, if he expires of natural causes. If you’re obstructing justice, cops, prosecutors and judges don’t think too much of that.”
Tall Wolf, took an audio recorder out of his briefcase and turned it on.
He gave the date, time, location and the names of those present.
“Ms. Crowther, please give the names and if possible the addresses and phone numbers of any guests you know of who have spent the night at the Goldstrike, California home of Hale Tibbot.”
Glynnis provided the names, addresses and phone numbers of a dozen women.
From memory. Including the proper spelling of names. Of both the ladies and the streets on which they lived.
Confronted by harsh reality, she’d gotten into the spirit of the moment.
Ron Ketchum had no sooner sat down in Clay Steadman’s office, the door closed and all calls being held, than the mayor told him, “I’m dying.”
The chief looked at the man sitting behind the desk. He didn’t see anything different about him than he’d seen for the last few years. Sure, Clay Steadman was aging, everybody did. But his face was still lean, his hair still full but fading from gray to white. His eyes blazed with blue fire as brightly as ever. His lips had compressed to razor-thin lines. His pugnacious jaw dared you to hit it, knowing you’d make the worst mistake of your life if you ever tried.
“You can’t see it,” the mayor growled, “if that’s what you’re trying to do.”
“I am, and you’re right. I can’t see it. Cancer?”
“Alzheimer’s.”
“Ah, shit.”
“That sums it up all right,” Clay said. “I was told I might have two more productive years left. Then again, a specialist from Sweden told me this morning that maybe it’s no more than one year. Then I go into decline and they might as well put me out in the radish patch for all the use I’ll be to anyone.”
Clay Steadman looked as if he wanted to make someone pay for the fate that had befallen him. The fact that there was no one he could blame only stoked his anger. For the first time since Ron had known the man, he felt uneasy in his presence.
The chief reached for the only threadbare offer of comfort he could think of.
“Is there anything I can do for you?”
The mayor’s smile was all bitter irony.
“As a matter of fact, there is. But I’ll get to that in a minute. It’s time I told you something about Hale Tibbot.”
Ron kept his face immobile. He silently prayed he wasn’t about to hear a confession.
Clay said, “Tibbot wanted to do more than put high rise condos and hotels on the shores of Lake Adeline. He had started a very quiet lobbying effort in Sacramento to legalize casino gambling in California. I don’t mean on the scale that the Native Americans do it. I mean like Las Vegas. Open to all potential investors. Like him.”
Ron Ketchum shook his head. “That would be bad.”
“Yes, it would. You can’t have gambling without civic corruption following and you know who would benefit from that.”
“Organized crime,” Ron said.
The mayor nodded. “Most times, I’d say there’d be at least a bare majority of pols in the state assembly who are smart enough to kill any attempt to legalize gambling, but California is so damn deep in debt right now they’re desperate for new revenue. Prop thirty just passed raising sales and income taxes, but it’s supposed to be temporary. Gambling could be seen as the big fix, permanent, with all the pain imposed on the suckers by the suckers.”
Clay shook his head.
He said, “The pols should know they’d be the suckers at the head of the line. They’ll wind up taking money they shouldn’t and go to federal prisons like so many before them. Well, it’s not going to happen here.”
“Because?” Ron asked.
“Because you asked if there was something you can do for me. I’m going to withdraw from the race for office. I want you to be Goldstrike’s next mayor.”
Chapter 17
“Sergeant Stanley told me I’d find you here,” Abra Benjamin said.
Ron Ketchum had been sitting on a bench staring out at Lake Adeline. He had no idea how long he’d been there. He must have looked sufficiently preoccupied to prevent any casual passerby from intruding on his thoughts.
The special agent from the FBI, however, was neither casual nor a passerby.
She’d come in search of him, with a purpose.
Although Ron had looked up to acknowledge her visually, he’d yet to say a word.
“Are you all right?” Benjamin asked.
“I don’t know yet,” he said.
He might have said sure, but he didn’t want to let lying to the FBI become a habit.
“May I?” she asked, gesturing to a place on the bench next to him.
She sat, perhaps a bit closer than normal.
“If it’s personal, I’m sorry to intrude. If it’s professional, should I know?”
“It’s both,” Ron told her.
“All right. If there’s any part relevant to my responsibilities, will you please tell me?”
Ron had to smile. “You’re really not like Francis Horgan.”
“I’ve been trying to tell you that.”
“It’s starting to sink in. I was just speaking with Mayor Steadman.” Ron paused. “Does your complement of good manners include keeping professional confidences?”
“Yes,” Benjamin said. “As long as doing so won’t compromise an eventual criminal investigation or prosecution.”
Ron thought about that, nodded to himself. He’d have to trust the woman, federal agent or not. He had information she should know and the FBI had the resources to look into matters outside his jurisdiction. Presenting her with a complete picture — or nearly so — would help the FBI with its investigation.
“Clay Steadman told me he’s dying.”
Benjamin cocked her head, peering at Ron from a new angle. “Jesus. Really?”
“He says it’s Alzheimer’s. Didn’t look like he was joking. Can’t imagine he was.”
Ron saw that his words had left a stricken expression on Benjamin’s face.
She’d been a fan of Clay’s? No, that wasn’t it. She’d known someone with the disease, had firsthand experience with how bad it could be.
“You know what it means?” he asked her.
She
nodded. “My grandfather. A warm, kind, brilliant man. The fall was so … steep.”
“I’m sorry. I knew Alzheimer’s was debilitating. I didn’t know it was fatal.”
Benjamin’s eyes filled with painful memories.
“It is, and it can be a truly awful way to go. My grandfather was confined to his bed. He became incontinent. He had difficulty eating and swallowing. He just seemed to melt away. He lost the ability to speak … but he moaned in such strains of misery it broke my heart.”
Ron gave Benjamin’s hand a gentle squeeze.
And then he tensed, the FBI agent sensing the change immediately.
“What is it?” she asked.
Ron told her, “I can’t see Clay Steadman allowing himself to die like that.”
“Chief, there is no cure. The only alternative is —”
She understood where Ron’s thoughts had taken him.
Clay Steadman would commit suicide while he was still able to do so.
Abra Benjamin clasped her hands on her lap, adopting a more professional and defensive posture. She said, “I’m very sorry to hear about Mayor Steadman’s illness, but as far as you know would he have any other reason to consider ending his own life?”
There were, of course, wrongdoers who would prefer a quick end to life to living out their days in prison.
“Now, you’re starting to sound like Horgan,” Ron told her.
“I’m sorry,” Benjamin said, not sounding at all penitent. “But you must have seen enough on the job to know how things can go. Someone puts himself in a corner, he might choose to go out on his own terms. Maybe even commit suicide by cop.”
Ron sighed and nodded. “You’re right, but that’s not the case here. What the mayor told me was Hale Tibbot was laying the foundation to lobby the legislature in Sacramento to legalize casino gambling in California, beyond those run by Native Americans. The mayor thinks Tibbot meant to make Goldstrike this state’s answer to Reno.”
A grin of amazement appeared on Benjamin’s face. “What, Tibbot thought he was Bugsy Siegel or something?”
“More likely the something,” Ron said. “Clay said he couldn’t find any connections between Tibbot and organized crime. The mayor’s assumption was that Tibbot thought he could pull off his coup and keep all the money for himself.”