The Second Reginald Bretnor Megapack

by Reginald Bretnor

  There seemed to be nothing more for him to do, so he settled back to scan the morning paper, trying to divert his mind from its insistent speculations. The press, he found, was too preoccupied with Mayor Munrooney’s nether nakedness to have any further interest in the mechanics of his demise. The headlines trumpeted Chief Otterson’s flat denial of the report; the news stories quoted “reliable police department sources” affirming it; and a boxed editorial cried aloud that the mayor’s reactionary enemies would stop at nothing to defame him, even in death. The columnists, of course, were best of all. One of them, after delivering a solemn threnody on the city’s sad bereavement, suggested that Dr. Grimwood, while he was about it, could have ensured Lucrece’s chastity simply by installing an adequately large cigar cutter in the proper place—thus preserving at least a large part of Errol Vasquez Munrooney for his constituents.

  Timuroff found himself bemused. Absurdly, he had the sudden feeling that the modern world had passed him by, leaving him in a dead backwater where nothing happened or could be accomplished. After Miranda Gardner’s revelation about the lock, and after a link had been established between the lawyer who had been in Albright’s confidence and Judson Hemmet, he knew logically that it was an absurd way to feel—but he cherished it anyhow, telling himself that it would be a good line to take with Pete in order to get him out of town.

  At three thirty, when Olivia rather shamefacedly returned from lunch, he tried it on her, but she was not impressed.

  “Henhouse nostalgia!” she answered cruelly. “Some people expect life to be one uninterrupted succession of excitements.”

  “So Pete told you about that, did he?” Timuroff laughed.

  “He did, and made me promise not to tell a soul. But I think you boys have very nasty playmates.”

  Quietly, she went to work; and presently Pete himself showed up, looking like the end of a dismal day. He had picked up one useful item of intelligence: part of Kielty’s evidence consisted of the khanjar’s missing sheath, allegedly discovered when he searched the Hansons’ quarters; the rest of it consisted of a key.

  “He says he found the key downstairs,” Pete declared, “and that it had no tag or chain attached to it. He claims that it was missing from among those in Hanson’s key holder.”

  “That’s not how Pambid told it,” said Timuroff.

  “You’re damn right it isn’t. Hanson’s own key was palmed when they were booking him—it must’ve been. Kielty’s bollixing the evidence—as if we didn’t know.”

  “How about gossip?”

  “There’s plenty, but my God! again it’s all about Munrooney’s friends. The federal boys are being awfully cagy, telling all they can without really saying anything. I didn’t get to see your friend Norm Edstrom, but the rest of ’em kept changing the subject back to Hemmet and Miranda. It isn’t what they say; it’s how they sound—the narcotics guys especially. After listening to a few of them, I talked to our own people and to Burgoyne. The way I’d piece it all together as of now is that too many really big drug busts happen on her property—not property she owns personally, but places owned by her dummy companies. As for Hemmet—and most of this is from our own boys or from state—his involvement, like Munrooney’s, has always been as some dirty-bird’s attorney, but the word is he’s sold his soul in Vegas, and that it’s only dear Miranda who’s kept the axe from falling. They’re all wondering did Munrooney know about it. And does Baltesar?”

  “Surely a little thing like that wouldn’t spoil their beautiful relationship?” remarked Timuroff, saying nothing about what he himself had learned.

  “Who knows? Anyhow, Hemmet’s credit is still good, and he hasn’t misappropriated any funds or anything like that, so it’s no one’s business but his own—yet. The same is true about his sex life, so we keep getting gossip instead of solid information. But there’s plenty of it, and from some weird sources. They say he’s taken to playing funny games.”

  “With whom?”

  “Women, I guess is all, but the kind who’re tabbed oddball even in the Tenderloin. He’s quiet about it, but it’s been leaking out. Maybe it’s female wrestlers rubbed with olive oil.”

  “At this point,” Olivia said disgustedly, “I’d believe anything, even a windup sheep.”

  “Dr. Grimwood is too much of a gentleman,” Pete informed her, “even to consider making one.”

  “That business of the scabbard and the key is interesting,” commented Timuroff. “What else turned up?”

  “Well, Burgoyne remembered that Leda Minden thing, though he wasn’t in on it himself. They traced her through fingerprints—no previous record, but she’d held some sort of federal job a year or two. She was from Pennsylvania someplace, and her real name was Schelfield—all very respectable and well-to-do, he said; they sent the money to cremate her, but without a message. He thought maybe it was Maxine Schelfield, but he wasn’t sure. He’ll look it up and let me know. After that—” Pete accepted the drink Timuroff offered him. “After that, something happened that really shook me up. I’d called Burgoyne on Jake Harrell’s phone—which I guess was stupid—and then I went on to the lab to chew the fat. I’m not there five minutes before there’s a call from Chiefy’s office, and Inspector Cominazzo’s wanted there right away. So I trot up, and cool my heels outside for half an hour before they let me in. Chiefy has on his God-the-Father-punishes-because-he-loves-you look, and he lays the situation on the line. I keep my nose out of the Munrooney case or get suspended and sent up before the board for insubordination.”

  “What did you say to him?” asked Timuroff.

  “Not what I wanted to. I almost did, but I figured just in time that that way I’d give him exactly what he wanted. So I ‘yes, sirred’ him from hell to breakfast, until he gave me another sales pitch on Disneyland and his permission to get lost.”

  “Well, at least we keep on eating for a while,” Olivia said.

  “We would anyway, sweetheart—my wife works. But this way at least we keep on snooping.”

  Timuroff shook his head. “You can’t afford to, Pete—at least not unless things change. Anyway, after this, some of your sources are going to dry up immediately. Even close friends of yours and enemies of Kielty’s are going to have to move with care. Chiefy and his friends can cut your throat from ear to ear, and theirs too.”

  They looked at each other somberly. “Let’s have a drink,” suggested Timuroff. “You need another one. I had a feeling earlier that somehow events were going to pass us by, for a time at least. Olivia described it as ‘henhouse nostalgia’ and hinted that I was missing the excitements of the Stitchgrove barnyard and the Great New Age, but somehow I don’t think so. I think we really may have reached one of those points where it’s just no use pushing things. I’m going to make what I think’s a pretty good suggestion—you know, rash youth being wisely counseled by prudent age. If I were you, I’d do exactly what Chiefy told you to—take off for Southern California. You won’t have to stay more than a few days—just long enough to send Wifey her pretty little postcards and lull him into perhaps thinking you’ve given up. You two can fly down and rent a car. I’ll take your messages and keep in touch by phone. If things break, you can always get back here in an hour or two.”

  “What you mean,” Pete grumbled, “is that you want to catch that phantom all by yourself—in case he’s carrying a rare gun.”

  “Now, don’t be cynical,” said Timuroff. “Think it over—the last place you ought to turn up for a while is Grimwood’s.”

  “Tim, can you spare me?” put in Olivia eagerly. “Pete and I haven’t been away together for a year.”

  Timuroff smiled at her. “I’ll arrange with Heck to lend me Muriel Fawzi. Even if she can’t learn to type, she can at least do a belly dance for customers.”

  Olivia giggled. “Just wait till I tell Mr. Karazoglu and Mr. Asteris
k. The three of you are going to have a ball.” Suddenly the air had cleared. Though Pete was looking at Timuroff suspiciously, even he was more cheerful. “Tim, you wouldn’t be trying to get me out of here so you can pull something too illegal for a homicide inspector to get in on?”

  “Whatever gave you that idea?”

  “Long association,” said Pete.

  There was a silence, and he could see that Pete was more than tempted—for there are times to get out from under, even if only for a day or two, and this was clearly one of them. “Look, Pete, if you two are really taking off,” he said, “why not have dinner with us? Emilia’s serving something quite enormous, so that’ll be no problem, and I believe Maestro Mancinelli’s coming up to talk to Heck about his wild opera notion. We can forget our fleas and have fun, and you’ll be off to a good start.”

  Pete gave in. He also gave Timuroff the home phone numbers of Jake Harrell and Inspector Stevens, and promised to call them up before he left, so that they could pass any really important news along. “I’ll let ’em know in Sacramento too,” he added, “and maybe I’d better call Burgoyne right away.”

  Olivia dialed the number for him, and he got Burgoyne immediately. Burgoyne was sorry; he’d been overloaded; he wouldn’t have a chance to dig into the files until tomorrow. Pete told him what his plans were, and to call Timuroff when he had anything.

  “There’s one thing we might try before you leave,” said Timuroff. “Your Sergeant Wallton was around Munrooney all the time, and Munrooney probably didn’t see him any more than he saw the furniture. I gather, too, that there’s no love lost between him and Chiefy’s crowd. He easily could have overheard something important. Perhaps he knows how matters really stood in that Munrooney-Hemmet-Baltesar-Miranda combine. Why don’t you try asking him?”

  Pete thought it over for a moment. “Probably he doesn’t know a thing, but it’ll be worth the try. Let’s see if he’s in.” He found the number in his address book, and dialed it. “Hello? …Hi, there, Natalie. This is Pete Cominazzo. Is the big guy home?… Yeah, I sure do. Can you put him on the horn?… Thank you, ma’am.”

  A few seconds, and Dennis Wallton was on the phone. They exchanged greetings and inquiries, talked bitterly and briefly about what was happening, and then Pete said, “Denny, officially I’m out of this. Chiefy slapped me with three weeks’ leave and told me to get lost. Olivia and I are taking off for Disneyland.… You heard about it? Okay, then there’s no need to explain. I think Kielty’s way off the beam, but Chiefy won’t even let me tell him why. You were around Munrooney and his friends a lot—you know, Hemmet and Baltesar and all that crowd. I thought maybe you’d heard some juicy gossip that’d throw a different light on some of this.… No? Well, I just thought I’d have one try before I ran out on the deal. … How’s that?” Timuroff could tell that Pete was trying hard not to sound surprised. “Denny, thanks for reminding me. I haven’t even been out to the range for two, three months, and with what’s been going on chances are I would’ve clean forgot it.… Sure, you can leave it for me with Mr. Timuroff, where Olivia works. Sure, when you can, in a day or two.”

  They spoke for another minute about wives and families; then Pete hung up.

  “Denny didn’t know a thing,” he said. “He’s never heard them say a word, except maybe on the weather. But he wants to give me back my target Smith & Wesson. He’ll leave it for me here.”

  “Sensational!” remarked Timuroff sarcastically.

  “It could be paydirt!” Pete grinned. “I’ve never owned a target Smith & Wesson, and I’ve never lent Denny a gun of any kind. He must have something really hot for us.”

  From that point on, and throughout the evening, everything was euphoric. It was, thought Timuroff, like those sweet, cool oases of hours and days in time of war, when the reality seems mercifully unreal and the brief escape becomes the only true reality. After the party, when he and Liselotte were once again in bed, he was able to persuade her and himself that, for the moment anyhow, nothing more could happen. But he awoke at three, puzzling over what motivated people like Hemmet and Miranda Gardner, and who the phantom was, and what course of action he should follow. He was awake for half an hour, and before he went to sleep again, he had decided to talk the whole thing over with Bill Traeger in the morning.

  After breakfast, he drove Hector Grimwood out to Evangeline, and, over a cup of Mrs. Hanson’s coffee, briefed Traeger on what had taken place, omitting none of it. “I’ve told neither Heck nor Pete about Miranda and the lock,” he said. “It might upset Heck to the point where he’d upset the applecart, and Pete’s much too vulnerable to stay involved at this stage of the game.”

  “Don’t worry,” Traeger assured him, “I won’t say a word. You know, the whole thing makes a crazy sort of sense, their being the kind of characters they are. Getting Pete out of town was sharp. It looks like maybe they’re running scared, which could account for Chiefy’s pushing him around. People have been awfully busy-busy here around the house—old panel truck parked where it hadn’t ought to be, and stuff like that. But Hemmet and Miranda being behind it all—well, it makes you wonder just who the phantom is, and why.”

  “There’s been no sign of him?”

  “None at all. He could be anyone—even Lawyer Hemmet.”

  “I thought of that,” Timuroff said, “but it’s unlikely. I only hope he won’t turn out to be a friend.”

  “Well, I guess it’ll be up to us to catch the guy.” Timuroff smiled wryly. “It may be mostly up to you. Anyhow, I hope we get him before the jaws close down on Heck and Hanson.”

  “We’ll try,” Traeger promised him.

  Timuroff said good-bye to him, and drove down to his shop. There he checked the answering service and found a message from Burgoyne, who had been wrong about the dead girl’s name. Instead of Maxine Schelfield, it had been Marion Schofield. They hadn’t gone too deeply into it because she was a known addict—maybe the federal people had—but call him anytime if he could help.

  Timuroff made a note of it, and settled down to his ordinary routine. He missed Olivia. His mail was neither stacked nor sorted; the envelopes weren’t neatly opened; he had to rummage in the files himself; and he was reminded more than once that his typing was by no means as neat as hers. It was with considerable relief that he kept his noon appointment with Norman Edstrom.

  It was a friendly meeting, but unproductive from the outset. There was some discussion of the Munrooney case; and Hemmet and Miranda Gardner kept entering the picture, by way of guarded references and questions asked which had to be more than just coincidental. But he learned nothing new. While Edstrom ate his hearty lunch, he nibbled a crab sandwich and listened, saying very little. The conversation turned again to guns; they drove back to the shop; half-heartedly he made a half-cash, half-trade deal for a flintlock pistol Edstrom wanted; they drove once more to the Federal Building. Finally, at the curb, he remembered the question he had intended to ask from the beginning. “Did you ever hear of a Marion Schofield?” he asked.

  “That Berkeley case? Heroin. Dead of an overdose, and self-administered. Isn’t that sort of a long way from Lover Boy Munrooney and Lucrece?”

  “Perhaps,” said Timuroff. “Perhaps not. Do you know anything about the girl?”

  Edstrom looked at him a little strangely. “No. Do you think I should?”

  “It might be an idea.”

  Edstrom opened the car door. “I’ll look into it,” he said. “If anything turns up, and if I can, I’ll let you know.” He stepped out onto the sidewalk. “By the way, her name wasn’t Marion. Berkeley had that wrong. It was Marianne—you know, as in Vive la France/”

  For a few seconds, until he remembered that he was in a red zone, Timuroff sat there. He was disturbed. Marianne Denham had left Reese Guthrie for some sort of fling with Judson Hemmet, and Hemmet had abandoned her in turn. Ma
rianne Schofield had died miserably in Berkeley of an overdose of heroin. The wild idea came to him that perhaps a curse had fallen on girls named Marianne—and that was followed by the thought that possibly the two Mariannes were one. He drove back to the shop again and called Amos Ledenthal.

  Jessica answered, and told him that Amos was busy at his lawyer’s. They liked each other, and for a few minutes there was only pleasant general conversation, Jessica pretending to be angry at her husband for Kielty’s involuntary swimming lesson, but still obviously pleased with him for it. Then Timuroff asked her his questions. Did she remember if that girl friend of Reese Guthrie’s had been married previously? One of his customers thought he’d known her. Jessica wasn’t sure; Marianne hadn’t often talked about herself. She came from somewhere back east, but she’d graduated from a Southern California college—was it USC?

  Could Jessica recall anything at all?

  “Well, just what she looked like,” said Jessica, “because she really was a lovely little thing. Oh, yes—she had a silver cigarette case she was very proud of. It was really beautiful, with a cabochon sapphire catch, and her monogram all over it in gold, MSD all intertwined.”

  Timuroff thanked her and rang off. He phoned Burgoyne and asked him if he knew the name of Marianne Schofield’s hometown. Burgoyne did—it was Wallis Heights, Pennsylvania. Timuroff dialed the area code plus 555-1212 for information. The town had two Schofields listed and one Denham, Wilbur F., Sr. He wrote the data down, and called the Denham number, but no one answered, and he decided not to try again until the rates went down at five o’clock.

  He was perturbed; he didn’t like the way things were pointing, and there seemed to be nothing useful he could do, so he went out again to Kemble Street.