Julius Katz Mysteries (5 page)

Detective Cramer hung up on me. Julius shook his head, a thin wisp of a smile showing. “The man’s a fool,” he said.

“Dolts and fools, huh?”

“Precisely, Archie. That’s what you’ve gotten me mired in.” He took a sip of his wine and sighed heavily. “They probably have a squad car waiting in front of my townhouse.”

“Probably a fleet of them.”

Julius was going to say something else, but instead another long, heavy sigh escaped from him. He sat almost comatose for several minutes, not moving as much as a muscle, not even blinking. When he finally came out of it he appeared relaxed. Shortly afterward he started chatting with two women sitting nearby. One of them was a redhead with a smooth, cream-colored complexion who gave her name as Lily Rosten. She closely resembled the actress Lauren Ambrose. The other woman gave her name as Sarah Chase. She was a brunette and I was able to match her physical characteristics to actresses that were considered extraordinarily beautiful according to online surveys. Both women, according to their DMV records, were twenty-nine. While Julius was charming and polite with both of them, his attention was primarily focused on Lily, which surprised me since I had rated Sarah as the more attractive of the two. When Julius’s table became available, he invited them to join him for dinner. They both accepted, but Lily indicated that she needed to use the ladies’ room and dragged her friend with her. When they returned, Sarah Chase reluctantly informed Julius that something had come up and she wouldn’t be able to join them. Julius didn’t seem to mind, and neither did Lily.

Dinner was a long, leisurely three-hour affair, and Julius was in rare form; maybe somewhat subdued at times, but even more charming than usual when entertaining. It was an odd effect the way Lily’s eyes appeared to glisten when she laughed, and even when she simply smiled. I also noted how they maintained eye contact almost continuously. When dinner ended, Lily announced to Julius that she lived in the Back Bay section of Boston off Marlborough Street, and Julius suggested that they take advantage of the pleasant weather, and that he walk her back to her apartment instead of calling a cab. I had already looked up her address and mapped it out to seven-tenths of a mile from where we were. Earlier, when I had tried filling Julius in on what I was able to find about her—the amount in her bank account, the fact that she was single and never married, where she grew up and went to college, as well as her present job as an administrator for a local nonprofit organization—he stopped me with a hand signal.

Just as dinner had been leisurely, so was their walk to her apartment building, maybe even more so. Somewhere along the way, they started holding hands. When they reached her address, they were still holding hands. I recognized the pattern—the way she looked at him and blushed and how Julius responded. It was clear that she was going to invite Julius for the night, and this would allow him to bypass the police, which I figured was what he was after all along. I was astounded when he gave her a quick and somewhat chaste kiss on the mouth and told her he’d like to call her in a few days. She looked equally astounded for a few seconds, but smiled and blushed even brighter than before and told Julius she would like that. Julius stood on the sidewalk and watched as she disappeared inside the building’s vestibule. Only then did he turn back towards Beacon Hill and his townhouse.

As I said, I was astounded. His actions didn’t make sense. They didn’t fit his past patterns.

“I don’t get it,” I said.

“What, Archie?”

“Why didn’t you go up to her apartment with her?”

He didn’t answer me.

“Wasn’t that the point?” I asked. “So that you could elude the police until morning?”

He shrugged. “If that were the case, couldn’t I simply check into a hotel for the night?”

“You could, but the police might have a watch on your credit cards.”

“That’s true,” he acknowledged. “Very true, Archie. It would be best for you to call Henry and have him waiting for us at the townhouse.”

Henry Zack was Julius’s attorney, and Julius had him on twenty-four hour call for just such emergencies. I knew Henry would moan about the late hour, which he did when I reached him, but he understood the emergency of the situation and agreed to meet Julius. I filled Julius in, and asked him again about Lily.

“I don’t get it,” I said. “She’s extraordinarily attractive, and it was clear from her behavior that she wanted you to join her. It was equally clear from yours that you wanted to, and you had your additional motive. This is a schism from your normal behavior patterns. An anomaly. It doesn’t fit.”

He remained silent as he continued along Beacon Street. After several blocks an odd, almost melancholy smile showed.

“There’s still a lot for you to learn, Archie,” he said softly.

That was all he was going to say on the matter. Along with Norma Brewer’s murder, I now had another mystery to solve.

It wasn’t exactly a fleet of police cars waiting at Julius’s townhouse, but there were more than I would’ve expected. Three in total, with a small congregation of officers milling around by the front door. Henry Zack was among them, and he was red-faced as he talked on his cell phone, his eyes bulging slightly. I spotted all this when we were two blocks away by tying into the outdoor webcam feed that covered the front exterior of Julius’s townhouse. I reported all this to Julius, and his lips compressed into a grim expression. He asked me to get Henry on the line.

I heard the unmistakable call-waiting tone as Henry put his other call on hold to take mine, and then I patched Julius in. “This is outrageous, Julius,” he said, his voice rising. “They have absolutely no grounds to hold you as a material witness, and I’m on the phone now with the Chief Clerk of the district court to have their warrant vacated. If they arrest you I’ll be suing the hell out of them—both the police department and each of the officers personally. Start looking for that retirement villa in Florence that you’re always talking about!”

Henry’s rant was more for the officers’ benefit than Julius’s. Julius informed him that he was three minutes away, and asked if it was safe for him to appear.

“It’s safe. It will be as good as winning the lottery if they so much as put a hand on you.”

Julius signaled for me to disconnect the call, and his pace accelerated as his expression grew grimmer. Within three minutes, as he had promised Henry, he approached his building and bedlam broke out. Henry was on the lookout for Julius and so he spotted him first. He attempted to distract the cops by bellowing more threats at them. It wasn’t until Julius was halfway up the path to his front door that the first cop noticed him, and then they swarmed toward him with Henry Zack in pursuit. A plainclothes detective with a large ruddy face and wearing a cheap, badly wrinkled suit reached Julius first. Having already accessed his departmental records, I informed Julius that this was Detective Mark Cramer. Cramer tried to shove a court warrant into Julius’s hands.

“My lawyer is standing right behind you, Detective Cramer,” Julius said. “Anything you have for me you should give to him.”

Cramer seemed taken aback that Julius knew who he was and reluctantly handed the warrant to Henry Zack, then turned back to Julius. According to Cramer’s records he was fifty-four, six foot two and two hundred and twenty pounds. He appeared heavier than that, my estimate being closer to two hundred and forty-six pounds. He also had less hair than the photo in his file. He appeared both tired and cranky, and he tried to give Julius a hard, intimidating stare.

“You’re under arrest for obstruction of justice,” Cramer said.

“Nonsense.”

That brought a wicked grin to Cramer’s lips. “Is that so? I have a court warrant that says otherwise, smart guy.”

“I couldn’t care less,” Julius said. “This isn’t a police state. You have no justification for this harassment—”

“No justification?” Cramer sputtered, almost choking on his words. He lifted a thick index finger as if he were going to poke Julius in the chest with it, which would’ve been a mistake unless he wanted to be wearing a cast on his hand for the next two months. Somehow he controlled himself.

“Norma Brewer, who was a client of yours, was murdered this afternoon. So far you’ve refused to cooperate with an ongoing police investigation and, as far as I’m concerned, you have been withholding evidence dealing with the crime.”

“That is utter rubbish,” Julius said. “I have no knowledge of Miss Brewer’s murder other than what was reported on the six o’clock news and you have no legitimate reason to think otherwise. I spent the evening at Le Che Cru entertaining a date, and am just arriving home now. Until my assistant tracked me down a short while ago, I had no idea you or any other police official wished to talk to me.”

Cramer was beside himself. “No idea, huh?” He jerked a thumb towards Henry Zack. “That’s why you dragged your lawyer down here at this hour. I’ve heard all about you, Katz, and I’m not about to put up with your nonsense!”

Henry started to object, but Julius put up a hand to stop him.

“Once Archie tracked me down and relayed your message, I decided to take the proper precautions.” Julius smiled thinly at the detective. “Now this is very simple. If you arrest me, you won’t get a single word out of me. Not now, not ever. I will, however, seek every avenue of recourse that the courts allow. On the other hand, if you agree to act in a civil fashion, I will invite you and only you—not this mob of yours that you’ve gathered at my doorstep—into my home to discuss what I know pertaining to Norma Brewer’s murder. Your decision.”

Cramer didn’t like it. I could tell he wanted nothing more than to cuff Julius and drag him into a police cruiser. He wanted to do that—that much was evident, but instead he stood shaking his head and muttering about the gall of Julius to keep a murder investigation on hold for hours and then to think he could make demands. It was for show, though. A defeated look had already dropped like a veil over his eyes, and it was clear he was going to give in. After a minute or so, his muttering died down. He nodded, almost embarrassed, and said, “What the hell, we’ll do it your way.”

Julius graciously kept a straight face and escorted Detective Cramer and Henry Zack into his home and to his kitchen. He asked if either of them wanted coffee. Henry accepted, Cramer declined.

“Would you prefer a French roast, or maybe try a new Tanzanian blend that I’ve recently discovered. It’s really quite good, showing subtle black currant and citrus flavors.”

“French roast would be fine,” Henry said.

“Are you sure?” Julius asked, not making any attempt to hide his disappointment.

Cramer sat propped up on a bar stool by the center island, and he was stewing. Finally he exploded, ordering Julius to forget about the damn coffee and tell him what he knew about Norma Brewer’s murder.

Julius measured and grinded the proper amount of coffee beans before telling Cramer that he knew nothing about the murder.

Cramer nearly swallowed his tongue, “Your suspicions, then,” he forced out.

“I don’t have any. Why would you think I would?”

“Why? Maybe because you were hired three days ago by a woman who was just murdered! How’s that?” Cramer grunted derisively. “You’ve been working for her for three days now. You must’ve come across something suspicious.”

“I’ve mostly been loafing since Miss Brewer hired me,” Julius admitted with a halfhearted shrug. “I met with her the day after she hired me, and since then I’ve been by myself, mostly reading for pleasure and puttering around. I left the townhouse once since my second meeting with her, and that was only tonight to go out for dinner.”

Cramer was glaring daggers at him. Julius shrugged again.

“I was planning to start my investigation soon,” Julius said. “It just hadn’t happened yet.”

“What did Norma Brewer hire you for?” Cramer demanded.

“A personal matter,” Julius said. “I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to discuss it.”

“Your client’s dead!”

“One of my clients is. Helen Arden accompanied her sister when I was hired, and I consider both of them my clients. If you obtain her permission to disclose the nature of the investigation to you, I will gladly do so.”

“Katz, there’s no such thing as PI-client confidentiality.”

“Which is why I had her hire me through Mr. Zack. Technically, I’m working for him.”

It was a bald-faced lie, one that Julius said convincingly. As I mentioned before, he had no “tell”, at least none that I have ever been able to discern. Cramer shot Henry Zack a look. Henry did have a “tell”. He would rub his thumb with his forefinger before he was going to lie, but Cramer had already missed it. Henry nodded and confirmed what Julius said.

“As an extension of me, Julius does have confidentiality with our clients. However, with Helen Arden’s permission, I’m willing to allow Julius to tell you about his conversation with Norma Brewer.”

Cramer’s face had been cherry red, now it was paling to a bone white. “You two have just been jerking me around,” he accused bitterly.

“No, we haven’t,” Julius said. “I didn’t invite you here under the pretense that I had any knowledge of this murder. You came storming to my home threatening to arrest me. I indulged you by offering to have a civil conversation with you.”

The coffee had finished percolating. Julius stopped to pour two cups, one for Henry, one for himself. After asking Henry how he liked his coffee, he turned back to Cramer. Before he continued he took a deep breath of air, expanding his chest, and held it for several seconds before releasing it. The anger in his eyes was genuine. I’d been with him long enough to know that.

“From the first minute you’ve done nothing but insult and accuse me,” Julius continued. “I should throw you out of here physically, especially after the charade you’ve been participating in, believing that I could be duped by such sophistry.”

Cramer started to protest with a forced indignation, but Julius shot him a withering look which stalled the detective’s protest to a mere stutter.

“Please, don’t insult my intelligence any more than you already have. You must’ve already talked to Helen Arden, which is how you knew I’d been hired, and I’m sure you already asked her what the matter was about and there would be no reason for her not to tell you. You couldn’t possibly reach the position of Detective with that level of incompetence, despite the show you’ve put on here tonight. Isn’t that true?”