Fools Rush In (The Sam McCain Mysteries Book 7) (12 page)

“’Night.”

After we hung up, I stood in the light of the refrigerator eating what remained of that large chunk of cake. I also finished off the beer I’d started as soon as I’d gotten in. I’m not sure you’ll find that particular combination—cake and beer, in your average cookbook, but it’s not as bad as you’d think.

The phone again.

No doubt it was Jane asking me to spend the night with her. Or Mary saying that she’d made a very bad mistake and was coming back to me. Or Janet Leigh asking me if I’d mind taking a shower with her because she was still scared after
Psycho.

The voice was male and tainted with whiskey.

“This phone may be tapped, so listen to me. I’ll be sitting on a bench by the wading pool at six a.m. tomorrow morning. I expect to see you there, too.”

A teasing familiarity, that voice. But he hadn’t spoken long enough for me to identify it.

A restless night. Not just because of the late call but also because I was beginning to think that Richie Neville hadn’t been alone in his blackmail operation. His brother James probably hadn’t come to town just to say hello. With his record for extortion, he had most likely played a part in the whole scheme.

And there was another reason for my restlessness. The bank statement indicated that four months ago Richie Neville had paid a year in advance for a safe-deposit box. I was eager to get in there and see. I’d need the permission of either Judge Whitney or Jane Sykes, but I was sure that one of them would grant it.

The one aspect of the murders I’d yet to piece together was the relationship of Richie Neville and David Leeds. Why had Leeds been at the cabin? What had he wanted with Neville? Given what I could reasonably surmise, Richie possessed far more salacious photos of Lucy and David than had been sent to the party office. The senator would have no choice but to pay a good deal of money for them.

The final thought was one I didn’t want to have in my head, but I had to consider it at least. Were Richie and David working together? Was David helping Richie get some especially good photos for the camera?

I hoped not. I just kept seeing Marie Leeds’s face as we talked and sat in the booth at Woolworth’s. Grief enough that her brother had been murdered, intolerable that he’d been part of the scheme that had likely caused all the violence.

The cats, sprawled across various points of my bed, got a lot more sleep than I did.

H
E WASN’T THERE.

I’d taken a cold shower, gunned three cups of steaming coffee, and chain-smoked half a dozen cigarettes just so I could be awake when I met him.

And he wasn’t there.

The summer morning almost made up for it. The birds sounded happy as drunks at a party and the clouds were as white as they’d been in those great old Technicolor pirate movies. The dew-gleaming grass had a sweet, almost narcotic aroma and the breeze reminded me of my brother Robert, long dead now, and how we’d always flown kites on such mornings as this.

I could almost forget how much our town was changing. Chain stores and chain burger joints and chain supermarkets starting to push our own merchants out. And the bedroom commuters a community unto themselves, separate and superior.

And then, behind the bench where I was sitting, a voice said: “Back here, McCain.”

He was hiding behind the god-awful pink concession stand that in summer bloomed with moms and kids and the smell of hot dogs.

His head was all I could see, and even that I didn’t see much of, given how low the brim was snapped on his fedora and the large sunglasses that made identification even tougher.

“Back here.”

I walked back.

When I was within ten feet of him, I knew who he was. And given who he was, I guessed he was probably right holding a meeting the way spies did in the James Bond novels.

“I’m sorry for all this,” Senator Lloyd Williams said.

He made no move to take off the hat or the shades.

We were screened by a dense run of pine trees behind us. Safe.

“My opponent hires operatives to follow me around.”

“Of course you’d never do anything like that.”

“I do it only because the other side does it.”

“Of course.”

“You always were a sarcastic bastard.”

“Are we here to run each other down, Senator, because if we are, I want to remind you what a chickenshit you were in sticking up for Senator McCarthy. Not to mention all the bullshit laws you’ve introduced to hurt poor people.”

I’d forgotten what a cranky bastard I could be in the morning when somebody irritated me.

“I can see I’ve made a mistake.”

He turned to go, the long body buried in a long tan trench coat whose collar ran all the way up under the back of his hat.

“Look, Senator, you got me out of bed this early, so I deserve at least the courtesy of an explanation.”

He turned back toward me. “You don’t like me and I don’t like you. That’s hardly the basis for a good working relationship.”

I’m rarely shocked these days. I was shocked. “You want to hire me?”

He was silent for a time. Those big, dark plastic bug eyes staring at me. “I wanted to hire you because I believe you’re as good as your word.”

“I like to think I am. I try to be. Sometimes things go wrong, of course. Beyond my control.”

“But you wouldn’t blackmail me. You’d do the job I hired you to do and that would be that.”

“You’re talking about Richie Neville.”

“Yes.”

“And him having photos of David Leeds and your daughter.”

“No.”

This time I think I actually flinched when he answered me.

No? Not his white daughter going out with a black man? What else would he hire me for?

“We need to make a deal right now. Before you say anything more.”

He nodded. “All right. I do want to hire you, then. But given your situation with the judge, can I be assured that you won’t share any information you gather with anybody else?”

“I’ll give you my word as long as the information I gather doesn’t cover up a crime.”

“Not a crime—a stupid—” He touched long fingers to his cheek. “I’m so exhausted from worrying about this that I can’t even think clearly.” Then: “Indiscretion. A stupid indiscretion.” Then: “A local woman. A prominent woman. Her brother has a fishing cabin. A very nice one. He’s been in Europe for the past few years. That’s where we—she and I—got together. And that’s where Richie Neville took photographs of us.”

“Marsha Lane.”

“My God, how did you know?”

“Prominent woman. Brother in Europe. Nice fishing cabin. You forget I work downtown. Had to be Marsha Lane.” Then: “I can see what you’re up against. First Lucy and David Leeds. And now Marsha Lane. Your campaign’s going to be a nightmare.”

He leaned back against the concession stand. He took out a pack of Chesterfields and lighted one with a Zippo. He hadn’t relaxed; he’d damned near collapsed. Even his voice was weaker. “I’ve thought of announcing that I wasn’t going to run again. But my family—if I announced that, the press would be all over. They’d know I was hiding something.” Then: “Ironically, I think I can weather Lucy and her young gentleman. But with Marsha added to it—” He threw his cigarette away. “It’s funny you’re the only one I can trust. But who knows what you’re getting when you hire one of those Chicago agencies. They could be just as mercenary as Neville.” Then: “What a great fix this is, huh? Somebody like you is my only hope.”

I didn’t like him. He brought out all my class anger. He’d been an overindulged preppy who’d come back here summers to tell everybody of his manly conquests back East. He’d never carried this county because so many people in their forties remembered him all too well.

But what he was talking about was a principle. Whatever I thought of him, he didn’t deserve to be blackmailed.

“I’ll tell you what, Senator. I won’t make any kind of deal with you except to say that whatever I find, I’ll turn over to you. I want to see you defeated but not because of some pictures. You don’t pay me anything, I don’t tell anybody about this, and whatever I find is yours.”

“I’m sorry I shot off my mouth and called you a name.”

My laugh was harsh. “That was a moment of truth, Senator. We basically hate each other. And a moment of truth coming from a politician is something to be happy about.”

I started to turn away from him. “I’ll be in touch.”

“Can’t I at least say thank you?”

This time I was the one who regretted being a bit nasty. I turned back to him and stuck out my hand. We shook.

“Thanks, McCain.”

I walked back to my ragtop.

D
EAR MR SSAMPSON

Please remit your bill, which is attached. This is the third time we’ve have sent it.

Sincerely,

Then, in light pencil: Needs your cig here, Mr. C.

“Cig” meaning signature.

“Think you could run this through the typewriter one more time, Jamie?”

“Was there something wrong with it?”

“Just a few things.”

“I really took my time with that one, too, Mr. C.”

“I just made little marks on it.”

I placed it on the edge of my desk for her to pick up. She wore a tight mauve blouse and a short tan skirt. She also smelled great. In the face of such things, what are a few typos?

The phone rang. I grabbed it.

No greetings and salutations. “Since you’re on salary, would it be too much to ask that you stop by my office?”

“I’d be honored to.”

“And I mean now.”

“Delighted to. Five minutes?”

“How about three? You’re not that far away.”

Just as I hung up, the mailman came through the door. His name was Henry Woolsey and he was an unabashed admirer of Jamie’s, fifty-some years notwithstanding.

“’Morning, Jamie.”

“’Morning, Henry. I see you broke out your shorts already.”

“Plenty warm for them. Too bad Sam won’t let you wear shorts.”

“Why don’t I just let her wear one of those French bikinis, Henry? Would that be good enough for you?”

Henry’s furiously flushed face contrasted vividly with his white hair.

“He’s always kidding around like that, Henry,” Jamie said. “He wouldn’t actually let me wear anything like that to the office.”

Henry started dealing out the pieces of mail as if they were cards and we were playing poker. I immediately saw what all the envelopes had in common. She just looked so innocent poised on the edge of her chair, I had to say it gently: “Gee, I guess I must have forgotten to put stamps on all these envelopes last night. Would you do that for me, Jamie?”

I was already late for the judge. Three minutes can go by awfully fast.

“I’ll probably be back in an hour or so,” I said.

Henry, the lecher, was already helping himself to the coffee. Young women like Jamie were in need of protection, no doubt, and Henry was only too eager to lend a hand.

He winked at me. “I like that idea you have for a French bikini, Sam.”

After I brought her up to date, she said, “My spies tell me you spent some time with Jane Sykes.”

“True enough. Your spies got something right for once.”

Judge Esme Anne Whitney’s office was one of timeless solemnity: deep leather chairs, rich carpeting, flawless wainscoting, two full walls of legal tomes, and a desk big enough to play a passing fair game of Ping-Pong on. It was always cleared off.

“Maybe you haven’t noticed, McCain, but the Sykes family is our enemy. They stand for everything we revile—or at least that I revile. And I assumed you did, too.”

“She’s cleaning up the police force, for one thing. And for another, she’s not going along with all of Cliffie’s arrests.”

“And she’s very good-looking.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed that.”

“I don’t want you to see her anymore.”

Per usual, she parked herself on the edge of the desk with a Gauloise and a cup of coffee laced with brandy. No rubber bands this morning, which was an indicator of how seriously she took this.

“I’m serious, McCain.”

She looked regal in her fitted gray dress and oversized, vaguely African-style earrings. No wonder she’d managed to find four men to marry her. Even in her sixties, she was still a desirable woman, if, that is, you caught her before a day’s worth of sipping brandy-soaked coffee began to take its toll.

“You can order me not to work with her. That comes under the heading of employment. But you can’t order me not to see her for pleasure. That comes under the heading of private life.”

This was my morning for shocks as she said, “I thought we were friends, McCain.”

My instinct was to laugh. The words hadn’t come out right, which I’d put down to bad acting. But then I saw the shimmer of tears in her ice-blue eyes and knew better.

The judge had never before said anything like this to me. She’d always made it clear that she’d hired me because she couldn’t find anybody any better who lived here in town. Not exactly your ringing endorsement. Never warm, most of the time barely courteous, sometimes damned mean, she was fond of reminding me of her social background and position and my lack thereof.

And now this. Served with tears yet. But those first tears were now followed by more tears that actually escaped her eyes and sparkled on her cheeks.

“I just feel so damned alone sometimes, McCain. No friends to confide in except back East; nobody to have dinner with at the end of the day.”

I knew what I was seeing, of course, but now wasn’t the time to talk about it. In the years I’d been her court investigator, I’d seen her drinking get increasingly serious. And now she was at the point where she needed to make the trip up to the Minnesota clinic that was disguised as a resort for rich people.

Four, even two years ago, she would never have let me see her so vulnerable. She enjoyed being imperious. She even enjoyed jokes about being imperious.

I found myself standing up and walking to her. I found myself putting my hands gently on her shoulders.

And she found herself jerking away from me and snapping, “Don’t you dare ever touch me like that, McCain! I’m your employer, not one of your little strumpets!”