LA

by Blake Banner

  “What about this chick?” He examined the file in front of him. “Sheila Newton. What do you know about her?”

  “Not a lot. She worked for the Cavendish Foundation and she was detailed to liaise between me and Charles Cavendish, developing a project in South America. We hit it off, we had dinner and last night she came to have dinner at my place, preparatory to a meeting with Cavendish tomorrow…” I checked my watch. “Later this morning.”

  “Yeah, I’m tired too. Tough shit. So you were having an affair with her.”

  “No.” I shook my head. “We slept together once, and she was probably going to stay the night tonight, but ‘affair’ is stating it too strong.”

  “She have a boyfriend? Husband?”

  “I have no idea. Like I said, we had only met a couple of days earlier. I really hardly knew anything about her. You want my opinion?”

  “For what it’s worth, sure.”

  “I think, one way or another, the target here is Cavendish.”

  “Cavendish…”

  “Yeah, this killer was there for Sheila. The way I read her she was young, pretty naïve and very committed to her work. Cavendish had taken an interest in her, was mentoring her. I don’t know anything about her private life, but I find it hard to believe she was into anything that would get her murdered by a hit man. On the other hand, if somebody is trying to send a message to Cavendish, killing Sheila, his personal assistant, is a pretty effective way of doing that.”

  He grunted. “What about the John Doe on your lawn?”

  “That’s not my lawn. It belongs to the block. You seem bent on the idea he was there for me. I don’t know why. But if somebody took out a contract on me, why the hell are they looking for me in LA instead of New York?”

  “I don’t know. You tell me.”

  I spread my hands and shrugged. “Well, OK, why am I here? To see Cavendish! I’m here to see Cavendish, Sheila was Cavendish’s personal assistant, the one thing that connects me, Sheila and her killer—and maybe the broken guy on the lawn, is Cavendish. So maybe he’s the target.”

  He sat a while with a pencil in his fingers, turning it around and around. Finally he sighed.

  “Yah…” It was a sound of disgust rather than agreement. He sat forward in his chair and dropped the pencil on his desk. “Don’t leave town, Bauer. Right now you’re not a suspect, but you’re a material witness, and I may want to talk to you again. Get the hell outta here.”

  “Thanks a bunch.” I stood with difficulty and limped to the door. There I stopped and turned back to him. “By the way, I’m not sure whether you registered the fact in that busy brain of yours, Costello, but I was one of the victims in this crime.” I nodded once. “You have a good one.”

  I hobbled into the dark pre-dawn of Olympic Drive and called Metro Cab. The taxi arrived in ten minutes. It was a short drive from the cop-shop to my apartment, but all the way there I kept turning over in my mind the same questions. What was the connection between the guy who claimed to be Air Force Twenty-Five, the guy who had murdered Sheila that night, Cavendish and Colonel Jane Harris? And if these people and these events were connected, then why did Captain Seth Campbell, allegedly of Air Force Intelligence, try to kill me where the man who had killed Sheila had no interest in killing me at all? And how could Sheila’s murder have any possible connection with the colonel’s abduction and murder?

  Even if you postulated a leak at Cobra, the colonel’s abduction had not been used to deter the hit on Cavendish. And if a leak at Cobra had led to the attempted hit on me, then why had the second hit man ignored me and gone for Sheila instead? However I turned it around and however many angles I looked at it from, there was only one explanation that fit the facts. There had been two hit men, each with a different contract, each sent by a different person or organization. Captain Seth Campbell, or whatever his real name was, had been sent by the same people who had abducted the colonel. They had forced her to talk under torture and she had told them where I was, in LA.

  The other hit man, the one who had spared my life so meticulously, who was so good and so well trained, had been sent by Cobra, with strict instructions to kill her and spare me. I wanted to find another explanation. I wanted badly to find another explanation, but as I looked out of the cab window, with the predawn blackness hanging over the Pacific like a sodden shroud, I could think of none.

  I paid off the cabby and dragged my heavy, aching body up to my apartment. The kitchen floor was still slick with blood.

  Sheila’s blood.

  Impotence and rage mixed in my belly and I felt a wave of nausea overwhelm me. I limped to the drinks tray, poured myself a large whisky and drained the glass. Then I packed my stuff, booked a room at the Hilton Checkers and called another cab.

  After that I called the brigadier. He didn’t sound happy to hear from me. He did sound sleepy. His first words were, “Do you need a lawyer? I’d hoped to hear from you before this.”

  “I don’t need a lawyer. I am moving out of the apartment and into the Hilton Checkers. Your apartment is full of Sheila’s blood. You’d better send somebody to clean it up. And if you want to take that as a metaphor, that’s fine by me.”

  “I told you that was not us, Harry.”

  “Well the operative was damn good. And if it wasn’t you, who was it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I can only think of one motive, sir.”

  “That doesn’t mean there is only one motive, Harry. It just means you can only see one.”

  “Yeah, my cab is here. I’m going to finish the job in the morning. Then we’ll talk. Meantime, you’d better have a good look at your board of directors and see if you have a leak, and if somebody is issuing orders and you don’t know about it.”

  “All right. I’ll do that.”

  I sighed. “Good.”

  “Harry, don’t make the mistake of walking away from your friends. We still don’t know where Jane is. We don’t know what’s happening to her. We don’t know if they have made her talk. That could look like a leak.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “Keep your head, Harry.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “You’ll have to do better than try. There is a lot at stake here, and you could do a lot of harm.”

  I couldn’t keep the bile from my voice. “You going to take care of me, too?”

  “No, Harry, but you could cause the death of Colonel Jane Harris, if she is not dead already. I need you clear-headed and focused. I don’t need you going off half-cocked. Get some sleep. Get centered, focus your mind and get the job done. Then we’ll see what we can do about Jane.”

  I sighed again. “OK.”

  “And Harry?”

  “Yeah?”

  “That is not what we are about. Perhaps you haven’t really understood that till now. That is not what we are about.”

  He hung up before I could answer. I stood looking at my cell for a moment, then went down to get my cab as the horizon started to turn gray in the west.

  * * *

  I had a pot of strong black coffee sent up to my room along with a plate of eggs and bacon and a box of the strongest painkillers they could find. I showered and shaved and changed my clothes, then had breakfast and took a handful of painkillers, washed down with coffee so strong and black you could almost carve it and eat it.

  By eight AM I was almost human and I called Cavendish.

  “Harry, I see you’re an early riser. I was just having breakfast. What can I do for you?”

  “Yeah, I haven’t been to bed yet. I have some very bad news and I need to talk to you in person.”

  “Oh.” You could hear the frown in his voice. “I hope you’re not planning to cancel the project…”

  “No, nothing like that. Listen, I’m at the Hilton Checkers. I had to move out of my apartment last night. Can I come over now? We really need to talk.”

  “Of course, Harry. Anything I can do to help, just tell me. Come on over, hav
e some breakfast with me and we’ll talk.”

  I thanked him, went down to the lobby and had my car brought round. Then I headed back toward the coast, to Pacific Palisades and Cavendish. I arrived at a little before nine. We went through the whole performance again of the cameras and the codes, and Tony trying to check me for weapons. As he approached me I told him: “I have a 9mm Sig Sauer P226 under my arm. Touch it and I’ll break every bone in your body. Now stop wasting my time and let me talk to your boss.”

  There was more talk on the radio, only this time Sheila didn’t come out to solve the problem. Because she was lying, cold, gray and dead, in the city morgue. Another woman came out, she was tall and elegant in her fifties, in Levis and a checked shirt. She ignored Tony and advanced on me with the kind of smile you can only buy in California.

  “Mr. Bauer, I am delighted to meet you at last. I am Karen Cavendish, Charlie has told me so much about you!” She took my hand, then linked my arm and led me toward the house. “We’re out back, by the pool. Charlie told me you’d had a bad night. I’ve told cook to prepare you some breakfast.”

  I hadn’t wanted to meet her. I hadn’t wanted to meet any of his family. He was a monster and I didn’t want to humanize him. But I smiled through the dull pains in my body.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Cavendish…”

  “Karen, I insist. And I hope you don’t mind if I call you Harry. Such a friendly name.”

  We crossed through the vast house, through the sprawling living area and out into a sparkling, turquoise, sunlit area of pool lawn and palms. They had a table out there, set with white linen, orange juice, tropical fruit, a silver coffee pot and toast in a basket. Cavendish stood as I approached and reached out a welcoming hand to me, his face furrowed with concern.

  “Harry, my good fellow, you look exhausted! What on earth has happened to you?” He didn’t let me finish, but pointed to an empty seat set with plate, knife, fork, spoon and napkin. “Please, sit. I have ordered you breakfast. We normally breakfast on fruit juice and muesli, but I had you down as a first-class protein man.” He laughed out loud. “Come on, sit. They’re bringing you eggs and bacon now.”

  He poured me coffee and I sat.

  I looked at the cup a moment, then said, “Charles, I hate to have to tell you this, but Sheila was murdered last night in my apartment.”

  He frowned like I’d told him I was the white bunny and we were going down the rabbit hole together. His wife took both her hands to her mouth and sat very slowly. Cavendish said:

  “What are you talking about?”

  “She called me, like you said she might. I suggested going out to dinner, but she said she wanted to cook something at my apartment. I said that was fine. She was shopping for groceries at Pavilions. I went to collect her and we drove back to my place. When we got in, she went to the kitchen and I went to the bathroom. When I came out somebody struck me on the back of the head, and kicked me in the back of the knee. I fell and saw him go to the kitchen. I tried to get up and go after him, but my leg wouldn’t respond and I fell. He shot her, twice in the chest, and once in the back of the head.”

  He sank down into his chair, supporting himself with his hands on the table. “Poor child. She had so much promise. So young…”

  “That poor sweet girl. Her parents…” It was Karen. She turned to me. “And poor Harry! What a terrible thing to happen. I can’t imagine what you’re going through right now.”

  I didn’t know what to answer, so I said, “Could I possibly have a shot of Scotch in that coffee?”

  The pretty French maid brought me a plate of eggs and bacon and hurried away to get the Scotch. A lot of people lose their appetite under stress. It’s a fight-or-flight response of the autonomic system, designed to keep you light, and the blood flowing to your limbs instead of your digestive system. My autonomic system seems to think differently, and at times of stress I consume a lot of protein, probably on the basis that I am going to need it and I don’t know when I am going to get some more.

  I devoured the eggs and bacon, and drank three cups of coffee laced with whisky, while the two Cavendishes asked me questions about the murder and the cops.

  “What I can’t understand,” said Karen at last, “is what the motive was. Clearly it wasn’t theft, because he didn’t take anything.”

  I nodded and wiped my mouth with the white linen napkin.

  “He told me it was a contract. I asked him why he hadn’t killed me. He said, ‘I was paid to kill her. I wasn’t paid to kill you.’”

  Cavendish sat forward, scowling. “He said that?”

  “Clear as daylight.” I took a deep breath and let it out as a sigh. “I don’t know how much you know about her private life, her family…” I shook my head. “I know next to nothing. We talked a lot, but she didn’t tell me anything about her background. I got the impression that all she really did was work.”

  It was Karen who answered.

  “She was from Nebraska. She came from a prosperous, God-fearing family. She was certainly never involved in anything like drugs or crime! Heavens! You couldn’t care to meet anyone more straight down the line, honest and moral. I cannot imagine that anyone would want to put a contract out on her. It makes no sense at all!”

  Cavendish had been frowning hard at the pool. After a moment he turned that frown on me.

  “Harry, I know you have had a terrible night, but there is a thought I have to share with you. I mean, is it possible…” He leaned forward, toward me, “Is it possible that you were the intended victim?” He silenced his wife’s protest with the palm of his hand. “I know he said he was paid to kill her, not you. But is it possible that she was killed as a sign to you? A message? Because, after all, you said yourself that you had made enemies over the years, dangerous enemies. Could this have been a way of saying, ‘We can get to you. Some things are worse than death’? Some of these people,” he added, “can be very subtle.”

  Twelve

  I stared at him for a long moment. “Who?” I said.

  He spread his hands. “Who are your enemies?”

  I didn’t answer, and Karen repeated the question.

  “Who are your enemies, Harry?”

  I was aware my heart rate had increased. I picked up my cup and drank before answering.

  “I couldn’t name them, by name…” I trailed off, aware that I had chosen an odd phrasing. “I mean, there are a lot of them. You make a lot of enemies, when you’re out on operations…out in the desert.” I could hear my breathing, loud in my nose. “I don’t feel so good.”

  Karen said: “Don’t worry, Harry, you’re in good hands. We’ll get you a doctor.”

  And Charles was leaning forward, peering at me. “But there are some enemies you can remember, aren’t there?” His face seemed to be a fish-eye view, slightly swollen around the nose, tapering in at the top of his head. It was slightly comical but I tried not to laugh. He went on talking, “I mean, you remember Mohammed Ben-Amini, don’t you? Do you think it might have been him?”

  “No.” I tried to stand, but the pool reared up in front of me and the sky spun around the palm trees. I slumped back in the chair.

  “Not Ben-Amini?” It was Karen, sliding into view. “Why not, Harry? Why can’t it be Ben-Amini? Don’t you think you ought to be looking for him?”

  “No, no…” I was beginning to feel distressed that they would be wasting their time. “Not Ben-Amini. He’s dead.”

  Karen leaned closer, stroking my face.

  “Ben-Amini is dead? Nobody knows that for sure, Harry. Surely he is just in hiding. The CIA took him in, didn’t they?”

  “Yes, but I killed him. I killed the bastard with my own hands, and it was no more than he deserved.”

  Cavendish was smiling at me. “Good man,” he said, “good man.”

  Then there was nothing.

  * * *

  I woke up in a bed. I had a headache and I felt nauseous. It took a while for my eyes to adjust to the light. They were
sensitive and painful. Gradually I was able to take in the room. There was a window on my right. The amber drapes were partially closed, but the window must have been open because the drapes were wafting slightly on a breeze. A glow of sunlight was filtering through, laying angular panels on the floor and on the bed. Set in the far wall, twelve or fifteen feet from the foot of the bed, were the sliding, wooden doors of built-in wardrobes, and over on my left was the half-open door of an en suite bathroom. Further over, just past where the built-in wardrobe ended, there was another door. It looked like the bedroom door.

  I lay for a while, listening to the sounds that wafted in on the breeze: seagulls, voices—indistinguishable words—desultory cars, far off, more sighs than roars, garden sheers.

  I pulled back the quilt and sat up. The room rocked. I felt cold, started to shiver and felt the blood drain from my face as my stomach lurched toward my mouth.

  I made it to the bathroom just in time and emptied my two breakfasts into the bowl. I washed out my mouth and drank some water, and felt well enough to look around. On the sink there was soap, toothpaste and a glass with a fresh toothbrush in it. The cupboard contained what you’d expect: toothpaste, a spare toothbrush in a plastic pack, floss, mouthwash, a disposable razor and shaving soap. The shower cubicle had shampoo, soap, a sponge and a back brush. There were clean towels.

  My leg was still hurting and I limped back to the bedroom. I pulled back the amber drapes and found bars on the window. I was on a second floor, surrounded by lawn and trees. About a mile away was the hazy ocean. Dotted here and there were large, sprawling houses, reached by tracks that wound through green countryside. It didn’t look much like Southern California. I wondered how long I’d been out. By the position of the sun I figured it was about five PM.